


X

by BadBlond099



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Batman and Robin (Comics), Nightwing (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Red Hood/Arsenal (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Robin (Comics), Under the Red Hood
Genre: Anal Fisting, Assassin - Freeform, Basically my mind went to dark places and I let it..., Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Double Anal Penetration, Exsanguination, Foursome - M/M/M/M, Gunshot Wounds, Heavy Angst, Knife Wounds, Lobotomy, Loss of Identity, M/M, Memory Loss, Strangulation, Techno-organic virus, Torture, rape as punishment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-21
Packaged: 2020-12-24 17:14:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 17
Words: 42,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21103061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BadBlond099/pseuds/BadBlond099
Summary: After calling it quits on Roy's ridiculous "heroes for hire" plan, Jason took it upon himself to tackle one of the biggest names in Gotham: the Black Mask.Three months pass with no word from him.X has no past and no life beyond his job. He takes orders from his boss and carries them out. Failing to do so means facing the consequences. When a target brings X to Wayne Enterprises, he runs into a few obstacles that make his job more challenging.





	1. Keeping up with the Bat

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome welcome one and all, to the result of a week of pure stress interspersed with encouraging words from QueenOfThePirates! The end result: every messed up form of torture I could think of while trapped in a beachfront house with two girls I couldn't stand for more than maybe an hour at a time!
> 
> Hey, my suffering became Queenie's delight, and now, after going through it again with a finer toothed comb, I see no reason why I shouldn't put the whole finished thing up on here! The only time between chapters on this one will be how long it takes me to edit! Mind the tags! I'm not the most graphic writer, but it was a rough week and I just needed my boi to suffer...
> 
> Without further ado, here's the saga of X.

*Mission complete. Report in.*

X stared at the target. It had been a while since he’d had any witnesses. The target was unusual as well. Zucco was familiar. Like someone from a memory that he just couldn’t reach. But it didn’t matter. There was no use questioning the boss. No point in making missions more difficult. It was a shame that there had been a witness. X didn’t like killing more than was absolutely necessary. It left a bad taste in his mouth.

“Who are you?”

X stiffened. He’d already killed the girl with Tony Zucco. Now this was just becoming a waste of ammo. Still, he had his guns in hand and searched for the other witness. It was clear that his company was using the darkness to their advantage, but it didn’t matter to X’s eyes.

The man in the darkness, dressed in a cowl and poised for a fight, was the famous Batman.

“I was just leaving.”

“Not on my watch.”

A line launcher shot at X. He managed to slide out of the way and slap the cord down under his foot, forcing Batman forward a little. X took aim, but Batman ducked in and knocked both guns aside. His speed was impressive. It only took a few blocked punches for X to recognize the difference in their speed. But every move, however calculated, was somehow familiar. Like he’d watched Batman move a thousand times before. It became less of a contest of speed and more one of prediction.

After a few minutes of keeping up with the Bat’s blows, X felt a smile creeping onto his face. Why was this so thrilling? It was like playing a game.

*Quit playing around. You aren’t paid to waste my time.*

X winced.

This had taken too long.

Predicting Batman’s next move, X got one step ahead and threw the vigilante off balance, taking advantage of the moment to snatch the grappling hook on Batman’s belt and flip towards one of his own discarded guns. He picked it up and shot the hook at the other. It latched on and he was able to retract it and reclaim it. Batman watched him move and X paused before leaping out the window.

“Who are you?”

“None of your concern.”

X leapt into the night and vanished among the shadows. He preferred the shadows. Something about moving through them, dodging the light from the street lamps, and crossing over and through alleys gave him a thrill. It reminded him that he was alive. He didn’t need much. He had the virus and he had nights like this. Sure, there were certain aspects of it all that he could live without, but everything had its balance. That was enough for him.

***

“Sir, might I suggest simply removing the front door altogether? Just seal it up. Make this mansion your family’s own mausoleum.”

Alfred’s sarcasm made the younger members of the family smile, but to date he hadn’t gotten Bruce to so much as smirk. “I was too late again.”

Alfred stared up at the screens. Video feed showed a man in a mask. He wore a sleek uniform not unlike Nightwing’s; solid black with splotches of red and white like poorly painted camouflage. The mask swallowed his whole head except for his eyes. Distinctly blue with green swimming through them. A rare coloration, for sure. Alfred had only seen the like with one other person.

“I called Dick. He’ll want to know.”

“Master Dick? I fail to see how he should be involved with an assassin. His hands have been full with his work as Nightwing. He has been quite busy picking up the slack in Bludhaven since his time with Spyral.”

“The victims were Tony and Sonia Zucco.”

Alfred looked at the screen again. The assassin holstered a gun and stared at his work for a second too long. In that time, Batman came into the picture.

“He did all this on security camera footage? That seems uncharacteristically sloppy. There hasn’t been a trace left behind in his other cases.”

“It didn’t matter. Facial recognition was warped. His mask must have had some disruptor technology. There was no match on record for fingerprints left at the scene. I wasn’t able to draw blood, so I can’t check that either. As far as the world knows, this man doesn’t exist.”

“There’s a lot of that going around,” Alfred muttered. The fight between Batman and the assassin began to play out on the screen and Alfred felt a chill. “He…read you like a book.”

“Not many people can do that,” Bruce noted. “I can think of only four people.”

“Ra’s, Cassie, Slade, and…me?” Dick had entered from the clock door in his full Nightwing uniform.

Bruce didn’t confirm Dick’s presumed list of fighters. “You got here quickly.”

Dick shrugged, eyes already on the screen. “I was in the area.”

“I thought Bludhaven had you staying away.”

“Bludhaven’s getting better. I was just visiting the area. I have friends here too, you know.”

Bruce just grunted and continued to watch the video feed, contemplating how to break the news to his first son.

“Is that the new assassin hitting up Gotham? Doesn’t look like someone from the League of Assassins or anyone Slade would be working with. So, it’s just some unknown merc? And he can keep up with you?”

“Dick.”

“Look at that uniform. It looks thinner than mine. I doubt there’s even Kevlar in it. He’s completely vulnerable. What an amateur,” Dick went on to speculate, ignoring Bruce.

“He’s not equipped for fighting. The only weapons on him were two guns. The only weapons he needed were two guns. He stole a couple things off my belt that will make him more mobile, but he was grossly under equipped for an assassin in Gotham.”

“And yet, what’s his kill count to now? Five? Six?”

“Seventeen confirmed kills. He added two to the count tonight.”

“Another CEO? Some rising stock-broker? Another Maroni?”

“Zucco.”

Dick froze. His mouth suddenly went dry. “T…Tony?”

“And Sonia.”

It hadn’t crossed his mind why Bruce was calling him in. He’d just assumed the Bat needed his old partner. Maybe he and Damian had been arguing again and he needed a mediator. But this?

“Why?”

“The assassin has been killing people in big business around Gotham. If it’s not his own, his employer’s motivations seem to be driving out competition. It’s a matter of narrowing down the suspects.”

“People in Gotham with a motive to kill big businessmen.”

“And women,” Bruce added quickly. “There is no discrimination between targets.”

“Right. Well shit.” Dick was still shaken up about the Zucco’s, though he was doing a hell of a job of hiding it. There had been a time when he was younger that he’d have celebrated the news of Tony’s death. Hell, there was a time when he wanted to be the one to kill him. Sonia, well, sometimes he felt she didn’t deserve it. Other times she made it clear that she was cut from the same cloth.

But to be executed…

“They didn’t feel anything,” Bruce said, doing that inexplicable thing where he read Dick’s mind.

“What makes you say that?”

“It was clean. One shot from behind Tony. Sonia may have had a split second to register terror, but one clean shot and she was dead as well. All of his other victims were the same. Single shot. No signs of struggle. No extra bullets. No wasted motions.”

“And he’s beaten you to every victim so far? Who is this guy?”

“I don’t have enough information to make a solid theory.” Bruce stopped the video the moment the assassin leapt out the window. He restarted it at the point when Tony was shot. Dick was glad that the office was dark.

Though, the more he looked at it…

“How’d he make that shot?”

“He’s clearly a masterful marksman.”

“Bruce, look at his eyes. Can you zoom in?” He did just that and let the feed play again. The sound of the gunshots could be heard.

“There are no lenses,” Bruce breathed.

“That’s what I meant. He made those shots in the dark. Could he be a meta?”

“Superhuman eyesight isn’t necessarily a meta-human trait. But it does seem unlikely that he would have managed such precise shots without at least some form of enhancement. Good catch, Dick.”

“Father!” Damian dropped in from the ceiling entrance, wearing his street clothes. “You went on patrol without me! I demand answers!”

“Master Damian, you weren’t even home,” Alfred reminded him. “I hope you brought home the hay for Bat Cow.”

“Of course, Alfred. Lois gave me her recipe for gingersnap cookies as well.” He handed a paper over to the butler. “I expect it mastered within the week.”

“Yippee. I shall leave you boys to it then. Do let me know if anyone will be needing dinner.” Alfred tucked the recipe in his breast pocket and returned to the mansion half of the cave.

“So, you located the assassin. Good. Where is he?”

“He got away.”

“Because you were a Batman without a Robin.” Damian pushed his way to the keyboard and started checking the video at his own leisure. It’s difficult to make anything out. Who were the victims?”

“Tony and Sonia Zucco.”

“Zucco?” Even Damian was familiar with the name. “Should he even be here?” Damian pointed his thumb at Dick, who might have argued if he didn’t feel the same way. “Go back to Bludhaven, Grayson. Father and I can handle this.”

“I called him,” Bruce said darkly. “And I don’t want you anywhere near this case.”

“You’re joking.”

“You come from a family of assassins. The last time we had a run in with a professional assassin, you resorted to your old ways. I won’t allow that mistake to be repeated.”

Damian didn’t argue with that. He hadn’t wanted to break his father’s code, but if he hadn’t, he was certain he wouldn’t still have a father. “But you need help taking him down, obviously.”

“And I’m here now,” Dick reminded him. “Don’t worry about it, Dami. We’ll stop him.”

Damian brooded quietly but continued to watch the feed, now at the point where the assassin and Batman were fighting hand-to-hand. “He’s good. I can think of only three people who can keep up with you like that.”

“Ra’s, Slade, Cassie, and…wait three?”

“As I said. Damian, stay away from this. Dick, stay close by and ready. I’m sending the videos to Tim to analyze. See if he finds anything that we didn’t.”

Damian clicked his tongue. “You trust the previous Robins then.”

“Dami, chill. How about you and I hit up the Gotham zoo tomorrow?”

“Might as well, since I won’t be of any help anyways.” Damian skulked up to the mansion and Dick took another look at a close up shot of the assassin’s eyes.


	2. Birds of a Feather...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With the latest mystery assassin loose in Gotham, the Bat-Family is on edge. The assassin--X--seems to be on top of Batman's every move. Outsmarting someone like that might require the sort of cooperation that, unfortunately, the boys aren't known for having with each other...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NGL, the name "X" came about because my first REAL DC cartoon addiction was Teen Titans. Not my only. I mean, I grew up on Justice League & Justice League Unlimited & Batman the Animated Series & Batman Beyond...and then some...But Teen Titans was the first of those shows to really feature as much humor as it did action. And my favorite twist: Red X.
> 
> Of course, X is a totally twisted take on that. 'Cuz if I've learned anything over the years, it's that I am obsessed with all things angsty.
> 
> But enough about me! More about my fav Bat Boys in action!

“Thanks for sticking around, Tim.”

“It’s cool. Any excuse to get a little extra overtime pay, right?” Tim leaned against Allison Blair’s desk as she backed up her work onto the spare drive. Her computer had crashed earlier in the day and Tim had been helping her to get all of the information back and backed up. It had taken long enough that the Wayne Enterprises office was already shut down for the night, leaving just the two of them with the dim light of her computer and his tablet. “Shouldn’t be long now. So, uh, you got plans later?”

Allison blushed. She was about seven years older than Tim and, while she was incredible at her job, she couldn’t even touch his intellect. Still, she was attractive and smart enough, and Tim was still on the rebound after his and Stephanie’s latest breakup…

“Oh. Me? Aren’t I a little old for you?”

“I’m not bothered by it if you aren’t.”

“Is that the best you’ve got, Drake? That is truly pathetic.”

Tim groaned loudly. “The hell are you doing here, Demon-Spawn?”

Dick and Damian clicked on the light to the floor. “We were having a family day…of sorts,” Dick announced.

“Yes. A zoo trip that Grayson promised to take over a week ago when he first came into town,” Damian grumbled.

Dick shook his head and noted, “Bruce and I have been busy. But Damian got you a souvenir.”

Damian, already moving past his annoyance, held up a large snake stuffed animal with a red bird in its mouth. “It reminded me of you.”

Tim scoffed. “You’re so not cute.”

“Oh! M-Mister Wayne! It’s good to see you!” Allison stood up from her seat and bowed awkwardly as Damian passed. “I-I didn’t know you were coming!”

“We’re just here to check on the middle child,” Dick teased, wrapping the stuffed snake around Tim’s neck. “No need to be so formal.”

“M-middle child?”

Tim was glaring daggers into Dick, but there was no shutting him up once he got going.

“Sure. Oh right, I guess he goes by his family’s last name too. Bruce officially adopted the two of us a long time ago. Oh, Richard Grayson, by the way,” Dick held a hand out to Allison while Tim slapped his forehead. “You can call me Dick.”

Allison’s eyes doubled in size as she met his hand with her own shaky hand. “Y-y-you’re Dick Grayson. You’re Mr. Wayne’s…And Mr. Drake is…”

“Seriously, Dick? My relationship with Bruce isn’t public knowledge,” Tim explained.

Dick gave an innocent look that only pissed Tim off more. “Oh. Well now it’s her knowledge. But she won’t spread the word, right?” He winked at Allison and, if it was even possible, she blushed hotter. Tim couldn’t help but feel annoyed knowing Dick’s reputation as a womanizer and the fact that he and Allison were much closer in age and thus, apparently, a more viable prospect.

“N-no, sir! I-I mean Richard.”

“Dick,” Tim and Damian said simultaneously.

That was when the lights shut off. The boys switched gears out of sheer instinct. There was no point in putting on masks or switching into costumes since Allison wouldn’t have to try all that hard to piece together their identities. But it seemed clear in an instant that there was a threat that would likely require their alter egos.

“Guys?” Dick checked in. He’d ducked down under a desk with Allison, ready to protect her with all that he had.

“South-side elevator. I don’t know how he got in, but he’s in,” Tim confirmed.

“I’ll take him out!” Damian declared, hopping over a cubicle and launching himself at the intruder.

“Wait!” Dick shouted, but he was too late.

The intruder swiftly ducked, just missing Damian’s kick, and then twisted his body to flip to the side and hop high enough to get over the wall of a cubicle. This man was far too agile for any normal person. There was a certain amount of practice to his movements that reminded Dick of a certain someone. He moved like he’d watched acrobats his whole life and had figured out how to maneuver himself like them through self-teaching.

Tim had noticed as well and was horrified with the realization. “Jason,” he said loud enough for the others to hear.

“Jay?” Dick dared to poke his head up to search for the intruder. “No…he’s past this. This isn’t right.”

“I’m not here to deal with more Bats,” the intruder announced. “Do me a favor and stand down. I will complete my mission. There doesn’t have to be any collateral.”

The way that the intruder spoke didn’t seem like Jason, but it was undoubtedly his voice. Tim began thinking through the possibilities. Jason was devolving. Jason was out of his mind. Jason was being controlled. They all felt wrong. This didn’t seem like mind control and, in spite of what Bruce seemed to believe, Jason wasn’t just another criminal from the alleys of Gotham. So, what was happening?

“Jay!” Dick calling out to Jason brought Tim back. “Jay, what’s going on? Talk to us?”

“Dick, shut up!” Tim hissed.

“Jason!”

X x X x X

X had hacked into the Wayne Enterprises server and corrupted the data on his target’s computer in order to separate her from the rest of the employees. Boss had given him a 24 hour time limit. Nothing out of the ordinary, but failure was not an option. Failure meant punishment. Punishment meant…No. X would carry out the mission. It would be like every other mission.

Or so he had thought, but someone had stayed with his target past business hours. This proved irksome. Still, X could demonstrate patience. Sometimes it was necessary to wait. Stalk the target. Decide whether or not to eliminate them while they had company. Witnesses were unwanted, but sometimes unavoidable. All that mattered was if they got in his way.

Of course, as time passed, rather than losing her company, his target found more to surround herself with. X was annoyed with the whole thing, but upon closer observation, the three young men felt familiar. The way that they moved. The way that they carried themselves.

“Bats.”

*What was that?*

X shook his head. “Sorry sir. It’s nothing.”

It wasn’t, though. X knew them. He knew everything about them. Why was that? Had he seen them in news footage? It was a possibility. His eyes picked up everything. It was nothing to recognize even the tiniest of habits in people. He had to pass it off as recognizing them from some news coverage or something.

Still, dealing with three of Batman’s associates would definitely slow things down. He couldn’t afford to wait any longer. It was time to make his move. Three of Batman’s sidekicks, after all, weren’t the same as Batman. Quality over quantity. This he could handle.

He shot out the front door glass and chose to be upfront and take the elevator. No reason to wear himself out with stairs before what would inevitably be a fight. The moment the elevator doors opened on the floor he wanted, his eyes located the sensor for the lights and one shot broke it, leaving them in darkness. Bats seemed to operate well in darkness, but X knew that he would be better.

X could hear the boys. They sounded coordinated. Calm. But the youngest—the one who was unmistakably Robin—broke ranks quickly and tried a frontal assault. It was foolish. X had guns. It would have been too easy to just take the shot and move on. But the boys weren’t his target and, if they were as uncooperative as Robin was, they were hardly even a threat.

One quick motion and X was out of range for Robin’s attack. Deciding that a drawn-out fight would put a strain on his mission, he used his momentum to bound up over one of the cubicle walls so that he wasn’t so exposed. It was then that he heard the middle one—Red Robin, if he remembered correctly—say a single name that felt painfully familiar.

“Jason?”

Why did that name draw X’s attention like a slap to the face?

He shook his head and kept his ears trained on the voices as some bickering ensued. Batman had been challenging. Every single motion made was efficient and powerful. These boys weren’t Batman. At this rate he was just wasting time.

“I’m not here to deal with more Bats,” he warned. If he could coax the eldest—Nightwing—to speak, he could locate his target and speed things up. “Do me a favor and stand down. I will complete my mission. There doesn’t have to be collateral.”

“Jay! Jay, what’s going on? Talk to us!”

Not what he thought Nightwing was going to say, but effective all the same. Still, that name made X feel anxious. Like he was forgetting something important, but it just wouldn’t come to mind.

“Jason!”

Why was Nightwing shouting that name? It was wrong. Unprecedented. Who was Jason? The question began to bother X.

“Jason! Please!”

Red Robin too.

X couldn’t keep wasting time. His target was still breathing. That wasn’t allowed. This was taking too long. He had to refocus.

“Damnit, Todd, what the hell is wrong with you?”

Robin was referring to someone else too. This was getting irritating.

Why go on hiding? They’d all given their positions away. He needed to make this quick, so he stood up and started to walk toward Nightwing and his target.

X caught Robin’s ankle as he flew at him again with a kick. Using the littlest vigilante’s momentum against him, he flung him into Red Robin, who had exposed his location, taking X’s bait just like Robin had. They toppled over the nearby cubicle with a satisfying crash. Broken monitor. Glass. They’d be picking each other up for a while. All that was left was—

“Jason…I’m begging you.”

Nightwing was looking right at X. There was no denying it. X’s perfect eyes—trained to find the weak point on any target—met Nightwing’s. He looked different, not in his full uniform. Normally those baby-blues would be hidden behind the lenses of a domino mask. X had no such need. His eyes could see every minute detail without being hidden. They allowed him to take in information and instantly process it. Looking at Nightwing now, however, felt wrong. He could see the creasing in Nightwing’s forehead. Not rage. Concern. Why did Nightwing believe that X was this ‘Jason’ person?

Why did it bother X so much?

*Terminate the target.*

The words flashed in Jason’s vision—a function that had been added with the enhancement, allowing his boss to send commands easily—and X snapped out of his state of confusion.

No more time for stalling. X steadied his right hand, gun pointed right at Nightwing’s forehead. The target was cowering in the cubicle behind him. Termination, in this case, required eliminating the opposition. “Move or die,” he offered as a simple ultimatum. “I don’t miss.”

“What happened? How did this happen? Why can’t you recognize us?”

Not the answer X was looking for.

“Suit yourself.”

BANG!

X never missed. X marks the spot. That was how it was supposed to be. But the bullet didn’t go where he’d aimed. It didn’t hit what he’d intended. Instead it lodged in the left side of Nightwing’s hip. The shot would hurt like hell, but it hadn’t hit anything fatal.

It wasn’t that Nightwing had moved out of the way. It wasn’t that something had shifted X’s arm to ruin the shot.

So why had he shot there?

Existential questions aside, there was no longer anyone in his way. He leveled the gun again, now that Nightwing had fallen, and fired a single shot at the cubicle. The target’s crying stopped abruptly. Normally there’d be no question, but after the odd shot at Nightwing, X stepped around the cubicle to confirm. The woman was slumped on the floor under the desk. She had been cowering, making herself as small as she could, but her voice gave her position away. Then it was just a matter of aim. A single hole between her eyes. A clean shot. The woman had been afraid, but now she wouldn’t feel again. It was as simple as that.

*Mission complete. Return.*

“On my way,” X confirmed verbally.

“Jay…”

X’s eyes flicked to Nightwing. The crumpled mess on the floor was bleeding out. In a way, this confirmed what he’d claimed earlier, just in a much slower and more agonizing method.

“I told you to move.”

“Grayson!”

Robin had recovered, though he looked pretty beat up. Anger was written all over him. The way he braced himself, poised for an attack, was almost cute. The kid was small. Too small for what he was doing. But every movement was calculated. Practiced. It was a trait likely pounded into him by the big Bat.

“Patch it up. He’ll live,” X offered.

“Doesn’t mean you will, you son of a bitch!” Blades shaped like little red birds flew at X like ninja-stars. It was…cute. He could even see the blinking lights, indicating a timed explosion. Red Robin took the opportunity to attempt an assault on X’s left with that metal staff he seemed to favor. Where they had been keeping these weapons on their person was a mystery to X.

Non-lethal. It was all out of rage, but nothing was genuinely threatening. Pathetic.

X dropped to his knees without wasting a second. The moment the blades were over his head, he shot one. It exploded into gas and tiny shrapnel right in Red Robin’s face, sending him reeling. After that it was a simple matter of staying low to the ground to avoid the gas.

The little Robin didn’t seem held up by the unintentional attack on his teammate, indicating discord amongst them. It was likely that they weren’t used to cooperating. Two Robins couldn’t accomplish what one could with the Bat.

Pathetic.

Hand to hand with the size difference between them was senseless. He did well to attack while X was on the floor, but it didn’t matter. The kid weighed practically nothing. One sweep and the Robin leapt. X rolled back over his shoulder, kicking both feet up. His heels collided with a soft chin.

While holding himself up in a handstand, a message came into view.

*Quit wasting time.*

“I’m not!” He lowered his legs, regaining his footing and tucking his gun into his right-side holster.

*You’re fighting a child.*

“You’re dead for that, Todd!”

X rolled his eyes and drew his gun right back out. It was bad if his boss was chiding him. It was past time to move on. The target had been terminated. The mission was complete. Anything else was collateral. “Piss off, Tweety.”

A sudden sharp pain between his pointer and his middle knuckle made him panic. He barely had the sense to stuff the gun back into its holster and sprint at the nearby window. He grabbed a desk, sent it flying at the glass to shatter it, and leapt out, grappling over to the next building over and out of sight, all the while knowing that he was going to be punished for his slip up.

X x X x X

Damian was visibly shaken. With Jason now gone, he took a frightened step back and exhaled deeply. Dick couldn’t believe what had happened either. Just a couple seconds earlier the second Robin had a cocked a loaded gun pressed to Damian’s forehead. Were it not for a well-timed Wingding that Dick had barely managed to throw, Bruce’s biological son would be dead on the forty-first floor of Wayne Enterprises, where the investment manager had just been executed as well. Based on Allison’s silence, Dick knew that Jason’s shot had found its mark.

Something was wrong with Jason. That much was easy to see.

“Tim, are you okay?”

The genius was just pulling a syringe with an antidote for Damian’s nerve-gas out of his thigh. “I’ve had worse scrapes with Jason,” he mumbled, the irritation thick in his voice. “I’ll collect the blood sample. Confirm it really is Jason and see if there’s any foreign substances that can be traced.”

Dick nodded and used the desk nearby to pull himself up. “Damian, I need some help.”

Damian rubbed his bruised chin and nodded before hurrying over to his once mentor. He took the coagulating spray from his pocket and pointed it at the bullet wound only for Dick to cover it with his hand. “No. Just bandage. Don’t close it up. Jay’s using hollow-points. I don’t have an exit wound.”

Damian growled, but tucked the spray away in favor of a disinfectant, gauze, and duct tape. “I’m going to kill him.”

“You’re not going to kill him. Whatever’s going on, he’s not himself. We have to help him,” Dick protested. Damian sprayed the antiseptic, getting a yelp from Dick and shutting him up.

“Well, he didn’t look like he’d been hurt,” Tim noted upon putting a swab in a vial and tucking it away in his belt. “And apparently the three of us being here proved to be a colossal failure. Bruce is going to be pissed. Hell, I’m pissed. Three of us and he still killed Allison? It’s pretty annoying to know that all three of us are that helpless against him!”

Dick knew better than Bruce even how bad Tim’s inferiority complex was when it came to his predecessor. “We weren’t prepared for him to go all out. He caught us off guard.”

“Speak for yourself,” Damian mumbled.

“Right. Because the little shit did so well avoiding friendly fire,” Tim snapped.

“You were in my way!”

“He literally threw you at me!”

“Boys! Please!” Dick tried to stand up only to stumble. Damian caught him, but not with grace. “We need to get to the cave. We need to report what happened here to Bruce. We need to analyze Jay’s blood. We…ngh…I need Alfred to remove the bullet.”

Tim and Damian shut up and helped Dick to hobble to the elevator. It was a little humiliating for the three of them to use the elevator to exit a Wayne building after so thoroughly losing a fight. They made it all the way to their motorcycles when they realized as a group how inconvenient their choices in vehicles were.

“We could call Bruce,” Dick suggested.

“I’m not ready to face that scowl. You think you can handle it while forced into the confined space of the batmobile?” Tim brought up.

“You can ride bitch-seat,” Damian offered.

“Okay, first of all, who taught you that term?” Dick began, mother hen-mode kicking in. “Secondly, I’m pretty sure I couldn’t handle a bike going over a pebble right now without going into shock.”

The three of them stood in silence in the darkness of the nearby alley, staring at their bikes.

“Alfred?” Tim finally brought up.

“Alfred.”


	3. Simple Comforts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even the smallest injury on the job meant a world of pain for X upon reporting in. Every agonizing moment made him regret failing to kill Nightwing just a little bit more. Making the same mistake would be a fool's errand, and yet, even in his spare time, X finds himself haunted by the familiar face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaand finally! First torture sequence! For all you Fight Club fans out there, this one's for you!
> 
> (Also, for all of you who just reacted to that toast, quit breaking the first two rules of Fight Club!)

“Careless.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Ignorant.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Foolish.”

X sucked in a scream. His boss was pouring hydrochloric acid over the cut on his right hand. His skin burned, but the pain from the open wound was beyond words. The exposed nerves were burning, but it wasn’t a normal fire. Chemical burn was the worst kind. It wasn’t something that would eventually stop or spread. It was going to keep eating away at him. Destroying his hand. Leaving it beyond repair.

Or at least, beyond repair for most people.

“Ignore a command again and I’ll make you drink this stuff.”

X could barely think through the pain. There was nothing but that acid and his hand. Nothing else could get through to him.

Boss stopped pouring, but the acid continued to burn. X’s shoulders shook. He couldn’t keep his eyes open. The acid had melted his skin. The knuckles on either side of the cut were exposed at the bones. He began taking hitched breaths. All of the training that he’d had for pain management was useless now.

“I think this has taught you something.” Boss took a dropper and let three drops fall on X’s hand. The techno-organic virus acted quickly, sealing the wound, re-stitching the muscle, and expelling the acid until X’s breath caught and steadied. The phantom pain lingered, but he flexed his repaired fingers and checked over the virus’ work. “What do you say, boy?”

“Thank you for sparing me, Sir.” X did mean it. The acid had been a means of punishment. He’d earned that with his incompetence. The techno-organic virus was something that he’d earned for his good work. Without it, his hand likely would have suffered from permanent damage. Temporary suffering replaced with a long-term fix. The reward beat out the cost.

“Good. In spite of your delayed return and your slip up, you managed to complete your mission. With Allison Blaire out of the way, Wayne Enterprises has faced a harsh blow to their stocks. Bruce Wayne will be fixing that quickly, but not without public spectacle. You’ve done well. You’re free until I summon you again.”

X bowed his head and took his leave. He continued to flex his hand in the elevator leaving the main Janus Cosmetics building. The pain was gone, but the memory still shook him. He didn’t like to fail. Failure meant pain. His boss had been kind enough to provide immediate treatment for the pain, each time, but the memories lingered. He hated the sensations but living with them for longer than he had to was even less desirable. It was easier to just complete the mission, report in, and take the time between missions to himself.

On that night in particular, he intended to numb the pain.

Boss never made him do two missions without a gap for rest between them. Though he took some pleasure in watching X’s suffering, he expected nothing less than success. Of course, this meant that X had to be at the top of his game for every mission. It was as simple as that.

There was a bar a few miles from the Janus building that was next to a library. X didn’t really have anywhere to go during these break times, and the bartender would let him sleep in the corner booth so long as he tipped her well enough, so he’d grown to like the place. If it wasn’t too late, he’d pick up a couple of things from the classics section at the library and settle into the corner booth for the night. On this particular night it was some of Dostoevsky’s shorter works and a play that he could vaguely recall hearing about.

Of course, everything was a little vague for X. His whole life was a blur before he came to work for Janus Cosmetics. It came in bits and pieces sometimes. Messed up parents. Fighting for scraps. Drugs to take the edge off. Drugs to sleep at night. Drugs to get through the day. He must have been an absolute mess before Roman found him and cleaned him up. He was grateful. The man had given him everything. Had fixed him. He could take a little pain if it meant he could continue to live the life he’d been given. Because he came from nothing, he accepted nothing from his past. Whoever he was before writing an X on the contract to work for Roman didn’t matter. Now he was X. Now he was necessary.

{“Jason, I’m begging you.”}

X settled into the corner booth and his jaw set as he heard that voice in his head.

{“Why can’t you recognize us?”}

“Hey, Hot-Shot. Still working on Clockwork Orange?”

Bea usually worked the night shifts. She confessed that she felt more comfortable around the types of people who needed respite in the late hours, and X had fit that bill perfectly. She was sweet. A little nosy at times, but never pushed hard.

X waved his latest book around. “Waiting For Godot, actually. Clockwork Orange was so last week.” He liked making small talk with her. She didn’t seem like the type to bother reading more than cheap romance novellas, but she took genuine interest in the way that he explained things and it made him feel heard. “Thought I’d try a play. They’re always quick reads, but usually a little more insightful to the human condition.”

“Oh? And what’s this one about?”

“Waiting on a guy who never shows up and the interesting things seen and spoken about while waiting. It’s an unusual concept, but apparently it was a very popular play in its time.”

Bea set a coaster down and hummed. “Sounds like this Godot guy stood ‘em up like a bad date,” she noted. “I see that kinda thing a lot around here.”

X looked up to meet her gaze and noticed something just over her shoulder. “I’m sure you do. And tell me. Are the people being stood up interesting to watch?”

“Y’know, they kind of are. The usual then? Feeling peckish?”

“Nowhere to be tonight, so go ahead and use the good stuff, I’ll make it worth the trouble. Put in a soup order for ten o’clock tonight too. Whatever today’s better option is.”

She nodded and gave him a wink as he handed her his business expense card. “Anything for you, my little Book Worm.”

X settled into his corner to feign ignorance and checked the spot next to where her head had been. There was a mirror above the bar, no doubt for extra security, and the guy at the end of the counter was checking him out in it. The man in question looked like a supermodel with a bum hip. His ebony black hair was naturally messy and he favored leaning towards his right. The crutch nearby cinched it. This lithe, attractive young man was the same guy X had failed to kill on his mission earlier. Had he been made?

The last thing he wanted was for his usual night time luxury to be ripped away from him by the idiot who he’d failed to kill. This was his sanctuary. It was the only place outside of the Janus building where he could exist and not be Boss’ personal assassin. And now Nightwing had come along and ruined that by not dying.

No, X had messed up. Why had he missed? There was no reason to miss. It was still frustrating to think about.

“Here you are, Sugar. Extra dirty martini, no olives, with a lemon twist. Just the way you like it.”

X resumed his friendly façade to keep Bea happy. “You’re a treasure. Can you do me a favor, Bea?”

“You name it.”

“That guy at the bar—the one with the crutch—I’d like to buy him a drink.”

Bea pushed her bottom lip forward a bit. “Ah, so you play for that team huh? Pity for me.”

“Hm?”

“Oh, nothing. He seemed interested in you too. He drinks the nastiest little things, though. So much sugar it could rot your teeth. Nothing pricey, though. Of course, I’m sure you could afford it.”

Somehow it didn’t feel ironic that the cool, night-stalking vigilante drank frilly things. An odd thought crossed X’s mind: “That really just fits.”

“Let me know if you need any help approaching him.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got it.” Bea went back to the bar and he took a few sips of his drink before checking the mirror again. This time he’d beaten Nightwing to the punch; the guy’s eyes locked on his in the mirror and he quickly sunk down into his seat, realizing he’d been discovered.

Something about the subtle victory made X feel confident, so he closed his book and left it on the table to hold his place, downed his whole drink in a couple of gulps, and moved over to the empty seat by Nightwing at the bar. “One more when you get the chance, Babe. No rush, though.”

Nightwing’s eyes were burning a hole in his shoulder. “Can I help you?”

“O-oh. No, sorry. You just look like someone I know.”

Either he was stupid or trying to be subtle. Either way, this felt too easy. “Well. I must admit, I was a little excited to see you.”

That seemed to throw Nightwing. “R-really?”

“Sure. It’s been a while. Always a delight to see that face, Pretty Bird.”

“You…It really is you.”

“Come here often?”

“What?”

“Look, we can play nice, or we can make this difficult. I like this place. I don’t need to cross business with pleasure.” To force his point across, X pressed his right thumb against the exact spot on Nightwing’s hip where he knew the bullet had pierced. Nightwing let out a soft grunt, confirming his discomfort. “Boss might not like me hanging around, though, if he knew that it would interfere with business. So just, don’t cause me any trouble and I won’t have to correct my earlier mistake. Got it?”

Nightwing moved too quickly and knocked over his disturbingly colorful drink. When the cool liquid dripped onto X’s hand the earlier sensations of the chemical burn were brought fresh to mind. He recoiled, almost feeling it all over again. He stared at his hand fearfully, but there was no sign of the damage. It was just a little sticky now. Nothing more. He was fine. If anything, though, he’d just shown weakness to an enemy. That wouldn’t sit well with the boss.

“And here’s—oh, Diiiick! You’re supposed to taste the rainbow, not spill the rainbow. And right on his nice suit too! What is wrong with you?”

“I…I’m sorry.”

X picked up his refreshed drink and turned away. “It’s nothing I can’t replace.”

*Report in.*

“What?”

“I was just saying sorry,” Nightwing muttered.

“No it’s—”

*Finish that drink. Gather your things. Report in. NOW.*

X felt crushed. So much for his easy nights off. “Right.” He downed the whole drink, set it on the counter away from the spill, and sighed. “Called in, Bea. Guess it’s overtime tonight. Write me up, would you? I’ll pay for two of his since he spilled that one.”

Bea was still wiping up the spill, but she seemed disappointed by his sudden need to run off. “Oh. I’m sorry, Sweetheart. I’ll have that right out for you.”

He picked up his books from the corner table and sighed. Unlike the unfortunate characters in the play, he knew better than to keep his boss waiting. He tucked the books inside of his suit jacket and returned to the bar. Bea was just finishing up his check and ran his card.

“You…Are you alright?” Nightwing asked when X was next to him again.

“What?”

“I…You look a little pale.”

*Be back in five minutes or else.*

X groaned. “No. I mean yes. I’m fine. Just…busy night.”

“Did your boss call you?”

“What?”

“I didn’t even see you pick up a phone.”

*NOW, X!*

“Here you go, Honey.” No sooner had Bea set the receipt on the counter than X had pressed an “X” into the paper with his pen. “O-oh. Are you—”

“Mark it for a $50 tip. Thanks.” And at that he was gone. Boss was pissed. That much was certain. He was in for it now.


	4. Reaching Out and Grabbing Air

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a surprising encounter with Jason, Dick returns to the Cave, desperate to uncover the truth about his brother's sudden change of heart.
> 
> It doesn't take long to find out who's behind Jason's shift. Tim manages to dig up live footage, showing exactly what Jason's experiencing, and what they find proves to be worse than any of them had imagined.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok! Let the torture resume! Sorry J-bird! Still my favorite Robin, I swear!

It was hardly surprising to find Dick working away at the computer in the cave when Bruce, Tim, and Damian had returned. His fingers were flying over the keyboard in a fashion that was usually only seen by Tim, which meant he was onto something. He had numerous articles and pages pulled up on “Janus Cosmetics,” which was a name Bruce hadn’t thought about in a while.

“Following a lead?”

Dick slammed his fist on the keyboard and pushed away from the computer in frustration. “Black Mask. It’s Black-Fucking-Mask. He’s done something to Jason,” he ground out.

“And what brought you to this conclusion.”

Dick’s eyes met Bruce’s for only a moment before darting away. “I…ran into him…at the bar.”

“Wow. That’s some luck,” Tim noted, approaching the keyboard to resume Dick’s research. “Did he recognize you this time?”

“Only from our fight. I don’t think he knows us at all. But that wasn’t the weird part.” Dick held up his right hand and pointed to where he’d caught Jason with a wingding. “I…I nailed him with a wingding to screw up his trigger finger earlier. It should have left lasting damage. I figured a Jason who wouldn’t be able to steady his gun would…well I’d ask for forgiveness later. But tonight, not even a few hours after everything, it was like it hadn’t even happened!”

Bruce’s voice dropped. “Elaborate.”

“No scab, no bandage, no scar. His hand was fully functional. It was like the damage hadn’t even happened. And he was suddenly upset after I spilled something on his hand. He got pretty jumpy.”

“Here,” Tim interjected. “Janus Cosmetics has recently started animal trials with a product that is hailed as a thousand times more effective than plastic surgery and infinitely easier to use. It can be programed to look however the consumer desires. It’s been coined the Techno-Organic Virus. It’s possible that Black Mask is using that on Jason to fix him up.”

Dick’s heart sank. “But that means that he could be hurt—”

“—and we wouldn’t even know,” Bruce finished.

“But it doesn’t explain why he doesn’t recognize us,” Damian pointed out. “I mean, maybe he did and just didn’t care?”

Damian and Tim had every right to believe that. Having both had horrible run ins with the Red Hood in the past that had left them hospitalized, what was another threat? But Dick and Bruce still believed otherwise.

“He’s not in his right mind,” Dick argued.

“He could still be controlled. It’s not something that Black Mask hasn’t accomplished in the past.”

“Yeah, but it doesn’t work on people with strong wills,” Damian reminded them. “And jerk as he is, I’d think any Robin would be able to resist Black Mask’s mind control.”

“I’m in,” Tim suddenly said, getting everyone’s attention as a video feed started to load up on the screen.

“In what?”

“Uhh, I’m not sure. It was some file in Janus’ mainframe labeled JTX Live Feed.”

[Fraternizing with the enemy now? Your loyalty is in question, X.]

Black Mask was standing over someone. The image blacked out every few seconds, as if it were someone’s vision and they were blinking. [I’m sorry. I didn’t know that he would be there. I tried to—]

[You nearly gave yourself away. Unforgivable.]

[It was a mistake. It won’t happen again.]

They all recognized Jason’s voice. Were they seeing what Jason was seeing? How was that possible? Why was he on his knees? What was Black Mask doing lecturing him?

[I told you what punishment would be next. I didn’t think you’d fail me so quickly.]

[Sir, I—]

CRACK!

The image shifted and Dick’s breath caught. Black Mask had struck Jason across the face. The sound was intense. Before he could recover, Mask had a hand on Jason’s chin, forcing him to look up. [No talking back, X! This hurts me almost as much as it hurts you. I hope you know that.]

A bottle came into view and Dick stood up in a panic. “We have to stop this!”

“How?”

“Please! Bruce, we can’t let this—”

[ULP!]

Dick covered his mouth. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think.

[ULP!]

Even Damian was looking away now, unable to witness what was on the feed without feeling sick.

Tim and Bruce kept their eyes trained on it, though, as Black Mask forced Jason to drink the bottle of hydrochloric acid.

Dick found the wastebasket in the corner of the cave and threw up. The sounds of Jason gulping became distorted. Gargled. Black Mask eventually stopped and let him go. His head dropped and he too began retching. Blood, fluids, liquefied parts of his insides. No one could survive such a thing. It was cruel to watch, but Jason was going through infinitely worse. Bruce’s hands had balled into tight fists at his sides as his son collapsed and continued to spit out his liquified insides.

[I only do this to ensure that you learn,] Black Mask said softly. The camera only showed his shoes at this point. Jason couldn’t get off the floor. Couldn’t scream. Couldn’t move. He was dying in an unimaginably painful way. Slow and torturous. Unthinkable.

And Dick had just seen him. He could have reached out. Could have helped him.

[You understand your mistake now, X?]

No response. No affirmative movement.

[Next time you encounter a Bat in the field, kill it. Fail to do so and you’ll suffer for it.] Black Mask knelt in front of Jason and lifted him so that his head must have been propped up in his lap. He then used a dropper to let a few drops of something fall into Jason’s mouth. [Do I make myself clear, X?]

After only a few minutes, the camera moved up and down, as if Jason was nodding. [Forgive me, Sir.] Jason’s voice had returned. He was moving. He was alive. [It won’t happen again.]

[That’s my boy. Now get cleaned up. That suit should be burned. No more leaving the building between missions. Heaven forbid your enemies should find you.]

[Of course. Forgive me.]

Tim slammed a hand on the keyboard in frustration. “This is fucked up!”

“Look!” Damian shouted.

Letters appeared in the bottom corner of the video feed after Tim struck the keyboard.

[Huh?]

[Is there a problem, boy?]

[No. Just…something seemed unusual. I will go get cleaned up.]

“We can contact him,” Tim exclaimed. But before he could get out a message, Bruce was at the keyboard.

“Don’t. We need to ensure that the messages won’t be found by Roman. Tim, work on setting up a secure connection to this feed. Encrypt it tenfold. If we’re traced, Jason could be in more danger. See if you can access old video files from this feed as well. Maybe we can trace what happened to him. Why he’s acting as X and how much danger he’s in. Damian, send out an invite to Janus Cosmetics for the Gala this week. We need an opportunity. Jason is in danger and it’s up to us to help him.”

Dick stayed where he was, tears dripping into the waste bucket. His younger brother had been tortured and killed by the Joker. He’d suffered through the hell in his own mind created by the Lazarus Pit. He’d come back and fought and hurt and clawed his way through it all. They were just finally earning back his trust. He was finally opening up. He’d stopped trying to kill Tim. He’d stopped hurting Damian. It was going so well. And then he disappeared. No one had thought anything of it. Just Red Hood off on another adventure.

Something was wrong. Jason Todd was gone, replaced with a single mysterious letter and an assassin with a dark history. Once again, they’d failed him.

X x X x X

Wayne Gala. The whole event felt stifling. Boss had insisted that only he and X would attend as a symbol of solidarity. It was twisted. Boss hated Wayne Enterprises. He hated them so much that in the past month alone the majority of X’s missions had been to kill off some of the heads of the company so that his boss could bring Wayne to his knees.

“Go on, X. Mingle. Charm. Keep an eye trained on me, though, or you’ll regret it,” Boss whispered as they both stepped into the ballroom.

A masquerade for the elites of Gotham. It was difficult to explain, but X felt more comfortable with a mask on. He figured it was because of the times Roman had branded his face. The techno-organic virus always fixed him up as good as new, but the memory of the pain lingered. He could still feel the letters even though they weren’t visible. Reminders of his boss. His owner. His god.

The two of them split up and yet, as ordered, he had constant eyes on his boss. Any suspicious activity and he was expected to be at the man’s side. Any request at all and he was to be at the man’s side. He was only there as security and reconnaissance. It was likely that his boss would find his next target at this gala. It wasn’t impossible to imagine that someone would be targeted during the gala. X would just have to be on high alert.

*Jason.*

X stiffened. That single name in the corner of his vision. It didn’t make any sense. There was no indication that Roman had sent a message or that he would use that name. Something was wrong.

*Don’t be afraid. I’m trying to help you.*

Not Boss. Definitely not Boss. “Who are you?” X whispered before a business woman in a gaudy feathered dress snatched him away and forced him to dance.

*I’m on your side. Please believe me. I don’t want to see you get hurt.*

“Tell me, are you from an elite family? You’re certainly beautiful. Perhaps you’d be interested in meeting my daughter?” the woman asked.

X smiled and carefully chose his every word. “I don’t think that would be appropriate,” he began, giving the woman a reassuring grin. “I work for Janus Cosmetics. I am Roman Sionis’ personal assistant. He takes very good care of me.”

*He basically killed you.*

“He can be a strict man, but a godsend.”

“Oh? I’ve never heard someone speak so highly of the CEO of Janus. Truth be told, he’s rather intimidating. That unusual face of his…” The woman was thrown by Roman being involved with X. Suddenly the dance was one of hesitation and X was able to lead with ease. “But you say he treats you well?”

“Before him I was nobody. Now, look at me. I’d say he’s been more than kind.”

*He made you drink acid.*

X stumbled and the woman stepped on his toe.

“Oh, excuse me. I’m so sorry!”

“Not at all. The mistake was entirely mine. But I’m afraid I should be going. I’m to keep an eye on Boss. Make sure everything goes smoothly for him.” He kissed the woman’s hand. “Au revoir, mademoiselle. Until next time.”

The woman blushed and moved on.

X straightened up, located his boss in the crowd, and whispered, “You don’t know anything.”

*Your name is Jason Peter Todd.*

“My name is X. Anything before X is nothing. Boss saved me. I owe everything to him.”

*That’s not true. You’re Jason. You stole the wheels off the Batmobile. You became the second Robin.*

X could hardly believe the messages he was receiving. He needed to get to Roman quickly. Report the error. He may receive punishment, but at least it would be lesser for first reporting to him.

*Please wait. I just want to help you.*

“Who are you?”

*A friend.*

“You’re an anomaly. I’ll have you eradicated. No room for errors.”

*I’m your brother.*

X felt his chest tighten, though he couldn’t understand why. “I don’t have family. My family is dead. Get out of my head. You don’t belong here.”

*Nobody belongs here. But I’m not leaving until Black Mask is out of here as well.*

This was wrong. X had been compromised. That meant punishment. He didn’t want to face punishment. He had to get to his boss quickly. He had to inform him of the intrusion.

He swam through the crowds, eyes locked on Roman, who had approached Bruce Wayne. Not good. X wasn’t to interfere when it came to Wayne. Doing so unnecessarily meant harsher punishment. Was he to let Roman know or wait? Which option would be worse?

“Need a drink?”

X stiffened. A younger man held a champagne flute out to him. Familiar hair. Familiar eyes. Familiar.

“Red Robin,” X whispered.

The young man didn’t even bat an eye. “Here I’m just called Tim. And you look a little tense. Are you feeling okay?”

*He’s here to help. Please.*

X took a nervous step away from Red Robin. “No. I mean, I’m fine. It’s not your concern. I just need to speak with my boss.”

“Who, Roman? He’s busy right now. Come on. Have a drink. I don’t bite.”

*Take the drink, Jason.*

“I’m not Jason.” The words came out louder than he’d intended. His heart fluttered. He felt cornered. This was bad. “I’m not…I don’t need anything.” He turned to leave and found a younger boy in a suit. Sharp eyes. Scrunched anger in his face. Robin. Why were they here?

“Take the drink, Todd. Don’t want to make a scene. Your boss wouldn’t like that much.”

*We just want to help you.*

Bad. No escape. Surrounded from all sides. These situations were common on missions. Fewer witnesses. Now? He’d have to be smart. Any scene would mean harsher punishment. Any slip up meant pain. “I’ll give you one chance to stand aside,” he warned.

*We’re here to help you, Jason. Please. Don’t make this hard.*

“There goes your chance.” X tripped forward, catching the champagne flute as he fell to the floor. “I’m so sorry! Old injury acting up. Did I get any on you?” He snapped the glass, spilled it at Red Robin’s feet, and jabbed the stem deep into his ankle. Before he could drop, X caught him and stood back up. “Sir? You don’t look so good. Oh man. Is there a doctor here? He looks pale!”

“What did you—”

“Thank you for helping me out. Can you hold him?” X handed Tim’s limp body to the little Robin, who could barely support the weight of his now limp ally. “I’ll find a doctor. I think maybe he drank something funny.”

*Don’t do this.*

“Too late. I mean, I really hope I’m not too late. Mr. Wayne! Perhaps you can help me? A young man seems to be feeling ill. I don’t really know anyone here that well. Our company is for cosmetic surgery, not standard physiology.”

“Well now. I thought I told you not to interrupt me,” Roman said suddenly, as X approached.

X’s jaw set. The pain behind his eyes was enough to stop him dead. He had to think carefully just to speak. “I…didn’t mean to co…compromise your…evening…”

The pain stopped and X tripped over his own feet. Roman caught him and the horror struck. He’d messed up. He’d embarrassed his boss. Tonight was going to hurt. “I’m sorry.”

*Jason! Get away from him! Please! We can help you!*

“Too late for excuses now, son. I’m very sorry, Mr. Wayne. He’s new to the company. Perhaps too eager. It would seem he had too much to drink. I’ll have him home right away,” Roman said quickly.

“Please. I’ll have a cab waiting for him outside. No need for you to leave as well,” Bruce Wayne suggested.

“No, I won’t just abandon him. He is rather young, you see. I want to make sure he gets home safe. Thank you so much for your hospitality.”

“Please, Roman, it’s no trouble. My ward, Richard, he will see to your employee. Get him home safe. No smudge on your record.”

“Forgive me for seeming rude, but don’t you have your own problems to deal with?” Roman noted in a growl, indicating the very confused and belabored Red Robin and little Robin that X had already dealt with. “I will take care of my own. Good night, Mr. Wayne.”

*He’s going to hurt you.*

“It’s your fault,” X breathed.

*Make an excuse to stay. Please. We’ll help you. I don’t want him to hurt you.*

“We’ll have this sorted out once your home, son. Come now.”

X hesitated. He was afraid.

*Tell him you’re too sick to go.*

“I don’t want to make a scene,” X insisted. “I’ll walk without assistance. I’m sorry for—” The pain behind his eyes returned with a vengeance. Boss was angry. He’d messed up again. Tonight he’d be lucky if he’d even be allowed to breathe.

*What’s wrong? Jason, talk to me!*

“Clearly you’re more inebriated than you’re letting on. I won’t tolerate any further shame. Now let’s go.”

X was scared. He was too scared. What could be worse? What tortures had Roman concocted? He didn’t usually defy the man this much. He was digging his own grave.

“I’m sorry.” He took a shaky step towards Roman and the messages came faster.

*Don’t do this!*

“Hurry it up, boy. You’re wasting everyone’s time.”

“I’m sorry.”

*Jason, this doesn’t have to happen! Just turn back! We can help!*

“We’ll discuss your behavior later. Now hurry up!”

*Please, Jason. Please. Just find an excuse to stay. Pass out. Anything. We’ll help you. We’ll protect you!*

Passing out might be unavoidable at that point. The pain in his head was overwhelming. Excruciating. It reminded him of the chemical burns. He was done. His body was giving out. But that meant he would further embarrass his boss. That meant his punishment would be worse.

“I’m…sorry.” He collapsed and Roman caught him.

X x X x X

“Honestly. Kids these days are shameless. I’ll talk some sense into him. Good night Mr. Wayne.”

“Perhaps our butler may be able to see what’s wrong with him,” Bruce said quickly, desperate to reach out and take his son out of Roman’s arms. “It could be something in the air. My ward seems to be experiencing similar symptoms, so—”

“So, your ward appears to be bleeding. Mine has suffered no such damage. Please worry about your own. I will ensure that mine receives the care that he needs.”

To emphasize the point, Tim tripped at the bottom step and let out a pained cry. Bruce spared one final glance towards Jason as Roman put the young man’s arm over his shoulder and hauled him down the stairs and into the crowd.

With no other choice, Bruce hurried to Tim and was quick to find the wound. Tim was pale because he was losing a lot of blood. He couldn’t stand because any weight on his ankle was painful. Jason had severed his Achilles tendon.

There was nothing they could do for Jason that evening. Bruce could only watch as Black Mask led the unconscious boy out.


	5. A New Kind of Punishment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> X messed up.
> 
> Time to suffer for his mistakes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I mean, based on the tags I've already had, I hope this was expected. I didn't go into crazy detail, but it's pretty obvious what's happening in this chapter. I'll drop the warning here all the same.
> 
> WARNING! THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS GRAPHIC DEPICTIONS OF RAPE! PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK!

“Wakey wakey, boy.”

X awoke gasping for air. He tried to reach at whatever was blocking his airway, but his hands were bound above his head.

“Black Mask said you were a real pain at the Wayne party, X. So we’re your punishment.

“We? What? No, I need to speak to Boss,” X rasped out.

“He said he didn’t even want to look at your face until it was wrecked.”

X wanted to protest, but something entered him. He was naked. Bound on a bed, and something had entered him. He tried to shout, but the man covered his mouth.

“You can handle a few guys. Boss said not to be gentle. Gotta love this new treatment he’s come up with, huh? We can wreck you all we want, and you’ll just be put right back together. Good as new.”

X struggled. Tried to speak. But he couldn’t get a full breath. Something around his neck was choking him. His eyes flicked downward. Some other man was stretching him with two fingers.

*Jason. Breathe. We’ll get you out of there.*

No. The wrong voice. The wrong messages. He had to tell Roman.

Three fingers.

X struggled harder, but the man holding a hand over his mouth pressed harder and mounted him. “Looks like our little present is feeling eager. Screw prep. Rip him apart.”

The fingers were out and fear really kicked in. X had anticipated punishment form Roman. This was too much. This was beyond what had been done to him before. He wanted the acid. He wanted the whip. Not this.

*Oh god, please breathe. Help is on the way.*

The man who had been prepping him positioned himself and thrust his entire length in in one go. X writhed in agony. The largest of the men was still sitting on his chest. Now he’d forced a finger into X’s mouth.

“You always did have a pretty face. No wonder Boss likes you so much. Think he did this before the project?”

*Project?*

“Ngh!”

X couldn’t help it. He bit down on the man’s finger. Nearly bit it clean off. The man who was inside of him was thrusting hard. With no lubrication the pain was unbearable. X wanted to scream, but he couldn’t get the air. He was fading fast. Whatever was around his neck wasn’t allowing him to properly fill his lungs. With so little oxygen, everything was starting to float. He was going to die like this.

SMACK!

His head lolled to the side. The pain in his cheek was fresh, but grounding. Real. He’d been punched. His jaw was dislocated. He couldn’t breathe. He was being violated. It was too much.

“Fucking piece of work you are. Shaming the boss then thinking you’ll get off easy just because you’re his favorite! You’ve got a way to go before he’ll give you any virus, boy. You have to earn it.”

*Jason! Jason we’re coming! Hang on!*

Coming. Yes. The man inside of him was coming. Hot and thick. X’s insides were being filled by a different kind of acid. It destroyed him just as much as the acid. Made him feel sick. And when the man pulled out, someone else took his place too quickly and it began again.

“You’re a real piece of work.”

X dug his nails into his hands, trying to focus on the pain there. Rasps of attempted breaths begging for air were interspersed by the cruel pace the man was setting. X was dying. He was losing it.

“Want to breathe? Beg for another dick in you and I might just cut the zip tie on your neck.”

*No. No, Jason, I’m sorry. We’re trying. We’re going to save you*  
.  
The message was becoming all that X could see. Spots in his vision threatened to overwhelm him. He nodded slightly and rasped out, “I…I can take…another…please…”

“That’s a good boy.” The man repositioned himself so that he was pressed to X’s entrance while the second man was still inside. A cold blade touched X’s Adam’s apple and, with one cruel thrust, the other man was pressed inside as well and the zip tie was cut. X gasped in air, his vision fading into bright spots as his lungs filled. The two men set a rhythm and with each unified thrust, X sucked in a breath. It hurt. It hurt so much. He was being torn apart. He wanted to pass out. Wanted to stop feeling. But the rush of oxygen was intoxicating. The pain was overwhelming. He was going to die impaled by two grown men because of those damned Robins. It wasn’t fair. It hurt.

*I’m here. It’s okay. Breathe.*

“I…hate…you…” He rasped out. It was meant for the sender of the messages, but a firm hand grasped his jaw.

“Now now, X. That’s no way to speak to your boss.”

He wasn’t even sure when Roman had arrived. Had he been watching the humiliation the whole time? It wasn’t clear. But something was in X’s mouth. It tasted salty. It was disgusting. It brushed the back of his throat and his gag reflex was stimulated. He was choking again. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. It hurt. It all hurt.

*Jason!*

X x X x X

Dick had been left in charge of the computer. He was communicating with Jason the whole evening. He saw everything.

When Jason was cornered, he didn’t back down. He lashed out. It didn’t matter that Tim was his brother, he was in the way.

Tim was still getting patched up. A slice to the Achilles tendon was no laughing matter. Damian might have gone after Jason if not for understanding of the severity of the injury that Tim was facing. The pain he had to be experiencing. It was all he could do to keep Tim up and out of harm’s way, shouting for Alfred. But Jason wasn’t concerned with that at all. He just rushed over to Bruce and Roman, ready to report the problem and expose that he’d been compromised.

As soon as he’d gotten Roman’s attention, however, something happened. The images that he was seeing became blurred. Jason started speaking with great effort. It was like he was in pain.

They had missed something. Some failsafe was still affecting Jason. Roman was still hurting him. This was bad.

Dick was pounding out messages on the keyboard, trying to get it across to Jason that he was in danger. That he needed to let them help him. But his words, however strained, were still chosen so carefully to match each situation. He informed Black Mask that he was compromised. He let Dick know that his help wasn’t welcome. And then he was just a crumpled mess in Roman’s arms.

“Damnit, no!” Dick kept sending messages. Trying to get through. Bruce did what he could to subtly insist that Jason be left there to recover, but Black Mask wouldn’t hear any of it.

Dick typed out one message that he prayed would give Jason pause.

*He’s going to hurt you.*

There was a light scoff.

[It’s your fault,] Jason breathed.

“No…No no no!” Nothing he typed out mattered after that. Black Mask had Jason in his clutches and wasn’t giving him up. The video feed cut out as Jason lost consciousness and Dick was left to wallow in defeat.

After a few hours, Bruce joined him downstairs.

“Tim?”

“Alfred patched him up. He’s not to walk on it for a while.”

“Damian?”

“Upset but finally grasping the severity of Jason’s situation.”

Dick stared at the black screen sadly. “He’s in danger, Bruce. He’s in danger and we know where he is.”

“If we act recklessly, Black Mask will have our identities.”

“Jason’s already pegged me.”

“You weren’t at the gala.”

“But Tim and Damian were. He made them as well. He knows there are a lot of Robins around you. He could tell Mask that at any point.”

“And yet he hasn’t. He could have killed you, but he didn’t. He could have created a bigger scene—”

“But Roman would have hurt him,” Dick confirmed. “I got through to him earlier. Got what I could out of him. He’s scared of Roman. Roman must be punishing him for mistakes and fixing him with the Technovirus to hide the evidence.”

“And?”

Dick bit his lip. “And Roman has some other means of hurting Jason. It wasn’t a control issue. When he was displeased, Jason responded as if he’d been in pain. We missed that, so I couldn’t do anything to stop it. That’s why he was acting weird.”

Bruce seemed shocked. “Damian hadn’t tranquilized him?”

“No. Jason effectively stopped Tim and Damian with that nasty attack. So…what did Roman want?”

“He wanted to buy Bruce Wayne out of his own company and make an offer on some of Wayne Enterprises’ shares. I was in the middle of turning down his offer when the commotion started.”

“So, he’s doing this just because it’s you? How did he find Jason?”

“Jason’s interrupted his business before. The two of them have bad history. It’s surprising that Roman is using Jason and not just—”

The feed came back on. Jason was waking up. There was a brutish man over him, talking down to him. Vital signs came up in the top right corner of the screen. Jason’s heart rate was disturbingly low for a man who’d been woken up so abruptly.

[You can handle a few guys.] At that statement Dick felt like he’d been slapped in the face. [Boss said not to be gentle. Gotta love this new treatment he’s come up with, huh? We can wreck you all we want and you’ll just be put right back together. Good as new.]

“Bruce.”

Jason’s eyes flicked downward. Someone else was opening him up with his fingers.

Bruce was over Dick and typing quickly.

*Jason. Breathe. We’ll get you out of there.*

The words didn’t seem to help him at all. He rasped out a shaky breath. It sounded like he was being strangled. Something had to be obstructing his airway.

“Bruce.” It felt like Dick was being strangled too. Tears pricked at the corner of his eyes.

The brute of a man moved so that he was sitting on Jason’s chest. He covered Jason’s mouth with his hand. The things he said broke Dick and Bruce’s heart. They knew what was happening. What was going to happen. Bruce rushed to the batmobile and paged Tim. “I need a lock on Jason’s location NOW.”

He was driving out, rubber burning as he drove into the night.

*Oh god, please breathe. Help is on the way.*

Dick could only pray that there was some comfort there. Jason’s vitals looked awful. His heartrate had spiked but his vision was getting spotty. The man was toying with him. Making it worse. Jason wasn’t getting enough oxygen. He could suffer serious damage.

The man mentioned something about a project that caught Dick’s attention. Did the project have to do with Jason’s memory? With his unusual means of being controlled? That was important.

SMACK!

Dick’s heart was in his throat. Jason couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t resist. But he’d upset the man and in exchange he’d received a solid punch in the face. It was hard to watch this. Hard to listen to the broken yelps as his little brother was violated. Batman had to hurry. He had to.

*Jason! Jason, we’re coming! Hang on!*

The sound of Jason’s breathing hitched. His heartbeat skipped for a second, then the squelching sound of someone moving could be heard. Dick didn’t have to see to recognize that someone had just finished inside of Jason. Jason was just a cock-sleeve at this point. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t see. Much more of this and he’d be dead.

[Want to breathe? Beg for another dick in you and I might just cut the zip tie on your neck.]

A zip-tie? No wonder. And the suggestion…Jason was already being used again. Now he was expected to take two? This was too much.

*No. No, Jason, I’m sorry. We’re trying. We’re going to save you.*

Fat lot of help that was.

[I…I can take…another…please…]

Dick was shouting obscenities at the screen. He was paging Bruce over and over again, trying to get the urgency across to him. How could this be happening? Had this happened before? Jason was being destroyed. Jason was in trouble. Jason was—

[Ahh!]

Jason’s vitals spiked. The sound of gasping was loud from the feed. Jason was finally getting oxygen, but at what cost? Still no Bruce. Still no sign of rescue. He was suffering and there was nothing that Dick could do.

*I’m here. It’s okay. Breathe.*

Maybe he could offer just a little support. Some gentleness in the situation.

[I…hate…you…]

Dick accepted that. After what he’d tried to claim, Jason was going through all of this. It was his fault. It was all his fault. Jason was going through this hell because he couldn’t save him.

[Now now, X. That’s no way to speak to your boss.]

The feed focused on Black Mask’s horrible face for just a moment before Jason’s vitals spiked yet again. Something muffled his breathing and the feed cut out.


	6. From One Hell to the Next

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce couldn't drive fast enough. Nothing he did could make up for his mistake. He never should have let Roman take Jason. Upon arriving at Janus to stage a rescue, he's faced with a new dilemma: a familiar killer, tasked with taking him out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still here? I'm flattered anyone would make it past that last chapter, honestly. Rereading this for editing is a pretty harsh reminder of the dark places my mind wanders to when I'm stressed...
> 
> But hey, I've come this far. Might as well go all the way (though as I write this now, it's creeping around the early hours of the morning after I started posting this up...so we'll see how much longer I last).

*You have your mission. Carry it out or face the consequences.*

X was as good as new. After the cruel session was over and the Techno-Organic Virus had fixed him up, he was finally able to say what he needed to Roman. The program that allowed him to receive messages was adjusted. He’d only receive his boss’s messages now. No confusing background noise.

He still felt dirty. Exposed. Broken. But he wasn’t allowed the courtesy of rest this time. Roman left his uniform on the bed and told him to hurry up. Seconds later his next mission came in. Still feeling groggy and hurt, he’d have to oblige his boss or face punishment worse than what he’d just endured.

*Kill the intruder.*

Non-specific. Annoying. He’d have to locate the intruder first. And, per the usual, if it wasn’t handled quickly and efficiently, he’d suffer again. After that session…he didn’t want to fail. He couldn’t.

Four chimes of the clock tower in the distance. How long had he been forced to take those men? How long had Roman allowed that to go on?

The Techno-Organic Virus left no trace of the trauma. It was best for X to push it from his mind as well. No more failures. No more mistakes. Find the target, complete the mission.

“Jason.”

X turned. Batman was in the windowsill. The dim light of the moon made him look menacing.

*That’s the intruder.*

“Well, fuck.”

“You’re okay? You’re…you’re not hurt?”

“I’m not Jason,” X told him, his hand slowly reaching for his gun. Batman wasn’t going to be an easy target. “Your little birds keep calling me that too. They missing somebody? I’m X.”

“You’re Jason Peter Todd. You went missing three months ago. You are acting under Black Mask’s control.”

Boss’ nickname. X wasn’t allowed to use it. Of course Batman would know it. “Nah. X is easier. Think I’ll just stick with what I know.”

*Quit with the games, boy. Kill him.*

“I’m here to help you.”

X cocked his head to the side. “Well then, this isn’t your lucky day. I’m here to kill you.”

Batman’s reflexes were incredible. X had his right pistol at the ready when a batarang blocked the barrel. He was smart enough not to fire a shot and instead threw the gun at his target and lunged. Batman dove into the attack as well. It was like colliding with a mountain. Was there any part of this freak that wasn’t armored?

It wasn’t easy while moving so much, but X was able to locate the weak points in Batman’s suit. Naturally, Batman’s chin was exposed. A hard hit could dislodge some teeth. Throw his enemy off. Pain wasn’t really something he liked to inflict on his targets, but this was going to require some extra effort. Mercy was a luxury he couldn’t afford. The joints were also softer. Had to be to allow for movement. The cowl made up for the weaknesses around his neck, but where he needed most movement was with his arms and legs. Shoulders, armpits, knees, elbows. None of these points would be fatal, but they could be crippling. Give him an opportunity to find a real weak spot and put an end to it.

“I’m taking you home, Jason.”

“I’m not Jason!” X pressed the end of his left pistol just under Batman’s arm and fired off a shot. Deep grunt. Good. The desired effect. X pulled away from their grapple and steadied his gun to point at Batman’s knee, but the man fired off a shot of his own.

X ducked away from the grappling hook, but the line started to wind around his neck. He had no choice but to put his right hand up to keep from getting choked. Batman yanked hard, forcing X to lurch forward. 

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

X was choking. He couldn’t breathe. Again. Fear was settling into the pit of his stomach. He was going to suffer. He was going to feel so much pain. 

X struggled. One arm was free this time. He could fight it. But if he let go of his gun he’d be down to just his own devices. He had to kill the target. Failing to do so was inexcusable. Kill. Kill. Kill.

Batman leaned over X and reached out to him. X thrust his pistol up, jamming it into Batman’s mouth. Obvious weak spot.

BANG!

Jason’s head hurt. Why? Why was the tension there? It was unbearable. It destroyed his focus.

No. Not his head. His…chest?

The pistol fell from his hand. Batman looked worried but alive. It hadn’t been X’s gun that went off. His mission was incomplete. “N-no…Please…”

*I’m disappointed.*

“I can still…I can still…”

“Robin!”

“He was going to kill you!”

“We have to get him to the cave!”

“I got that stuff that you wanted. Fix him.”

*You’ll be punished for this.*

“I…I’m sorry…”

*See you soon, son.*


	7. Identity Crisis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> X is brought to the Bat-Cave, where familiar people try to help him come to terms with who he really is. Evidence all points towards their beliefs, but he still can't bring himself to fully accept it. The Bats, however, offer a reprieve that gives him the opportunity to breathe for a change. So he drops his defenses and allows these practical strangers to take care of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaand finally it's time to see what made Jason into X! Concretely! Still brutal stuff, I'll warn, but for everyone looking for some light at the end of the tunnel, well, this is at least a preview for what could be; J-bird (or X), chooses to take the reprieve offered to him. No promises past that!

Tim struggled even with Dick’s and Alfred’s help to get to the cave. After what had happened to Jason, the feed had been cut and they’d been kicked out. They needed Tim to regain access and quick. Jason was in danger. Bruce was on his way. Dick was worried sick about them.

Tim settled into his usual seat at the computer and his fingers flew across the keys with trained precision. “I don’t understand, Master Dick. What has happened to Master Jason? Is he alright?”

The nightmarish rape played out in Dick’s mind. “No. No, he’s in real trouble. We have to help him.”

Alfred hated to hear that Jason was in danger. Even after all he’d done, he was still the poor young boy who’d died in Bruce’s arms. He was the lost Robin. He was the prodigal son who returned home against all odds. “Please do what you can, Master Tim.”

“And we’re patched. Something’s different, though. I can’t get a message out to him. I’ll keep trying to establish a link, but, we can at least see what he sees.”

“See what he sees?” Alfred inquired.

“It’s hard to explain,” Dick warned. “Like we’re seeing out of his eyes.”

“It has to do with Janus Cosmetics’ new Techno-Organic Virus treatment. It’s composed of microorganisms. Nano-bots, if you will. And they can be programmed for almost anything. In this case, they’re connected to Jason’s optic nerves.” Tim explained.

“What? But wouldn’t that mean they’re in his head?” The thought made Dick sick again. “Oh god, Tim, could they alter his brain?”

Tim nodded. “That’s what I’m thinking. Less alter and more repair. If there was damage, they’d repair it.”

“So, Jason would have to have suffered brain damage?”

Tim swallowed hard. “I think…It’s highly likely.”

Alfred gasped.

“If the memories of most of his life were removed, the virus could be programmed to recreate it. Fill in the gaps. Hence X doesn’t know that he’s Jason.”

The screen lit up with a scene. Jason was awake. He sat up quickly and checked himself over. No bruises. No cuts. No signs of…But he was naked. Tim seemed to be alarmed by that. “What the hell? Great to know Black Mask’s a pervert too.”

Dick winced. He didn’t want to tell Tim anything he didn’t have to.

A uniform had been left behind for Jason. He sighed but put it on. The moment he was dressed a message came across the bottom of the screen.

*You have your mission. Carry it out or face the consequences.*

“A mission?”

“He claimed Allison was his last mission,” Tim stated. “He’s expected to kill someone.”

Dick shuddered. Expected to kill immediately after…It was unforgivable.

Jason fitted his guns into his holsters and stepped out. It wasn’t clear where he was, but he seemed to know where he was going. In no time he was in an elevator, when he stepped out another message appeared.

*Kill the intruder.*

“Shit,” Dick exclaimed.

“Hm?”

“Bruce went after Jason.”

“So what? Jason wouldn’t be able to get the drop on Bruce on a good day. There’s nothing to worry about.”

“Bruce doesn’t want to hurt Jason and Jason doesn’t have any connection to Bruce. It’s not going to go well,” Dick reminded them.

Tim sighed and continued typing away. “Well, let’s just hope Bruce gets him home.”

What ensued was a mess. Bruce tried to reach out. Tried to get through to Jason, but he kept referring to himself as “X.” Dick and Tim watched anxiously as Bruce did what he could to keep Jason calm. The messages that appeared on screen, however, were threatening. All about finishing the job fast or facing consequences. Considering the consequences that Dick had witnessed, he wasn’t sure how he wanted this to go. Bruce needed to get him back. He had to.

It looked like Batman had the upper hand, but then Jason pulled a sick trick and shot Bruce under the arm, right in a weak spot in his armor. Dick hissed through his teeth, almost able to feel the pain. Tim winced and held his breath. The two of them felt helpless. Jason kept finding new ways to get out of corners. He was like a wild animal backed against a wall. It never ended well, but Bruce kept managing it. He kept backing him in. Kept him on the defensive.

Then Jason shoved his gun right into Bruce’s mouth.

“No!”

BANG!

Dick couldn’t look up. He couldn’t.

“The feed cut out,” Tim noted, already rapidly working the keyboard, desperate to get it back. “Fuck!” Tim punched the keyboard, causing a small short. “I can’t get it back.”

Dick couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think. What had happened? Was Bruce…? Could Jason actually have…?

It was just then that the Batmobile rolled into the cave. Dick hobbled over, forgetting about his crutch as his heart felt like it was in a vice. What was going to come out of the car? Who was going to come out? What had happened? He was worried beyond words. Tim wound up using Dick’s crutch to guide the wheelie chair over as far as he could as well. When the top of the car opened, Damian hopped out looking no worse for wear and Dick stared at him in astonishment.

“When did you—”

“Stealth is an important trait. Now get out of the way. You two will not be useful as you are.”

“Useful?”

Bruce hopped out and moved around to the back where the Batmobile opened to reveal its hidden passenger seats. Jason was strapped into one, bleeding out from a gunshot wound in his abdomen.

“Jay!”

“Move, Dick.”

Bruce, in spite of his own injuries, had Jason in his arms quickly and brought him over to the ever-present gurney in the cave. Alfred came over quickly in a panic. “He needs more medical attention than I can offer!”

“It’s okay. We’ve got it covered,” Damian said, holding up a small vial of some silvery liquid.

“Help me to strap him down,” Bruce demanded of Alfred, who was shaken by the suggestion.

“Is that really necessary, sir?”

“We don’t know the extent of Black Mask’s control over him. We can’t risk him attacking with the state that Dick and Tim are in.”

Alfred didn’t argue with that. He used the leather straps to cuff Jason’s wrists to the table. Dick watched with increasing worry as Damian handed the vial to Bruce.

“Wait! Is that the Techno-Organic Virus? A sample like that could be invaluable to undoing whatever’s been done to him!” Tim pointed out.

“His life is more important right now.” Bruce held the vial over Jason’s open wound and carefully poured the few drops worth in.

The room was silent save for Jason’s labored breathing and the computer’s quiet whirring. Everyone was holding their breath, waiting to see what would happen. What they watched was miraculous. The silver liquid seemed to come to life and within seconds had spat out the bullet that had been lodged inside of him before knitting together into what looked like regular skin, covering up all signs of the injury aside from the blood that had already been lost.

“He’s…he’s okay then?” Dick dared to ask.

Very suddenly, Jason strained against the straps to the point where the holes in the leather stretched. “Wh-where am I? What do you want from me? No…you’re…you’re the target. Damn. I’m so in for it.” Jason stopped straining just when Alfred was afraid that the straps would actually give out. He relaxed against the gurney and sighed. “Do what you will.”

Dick’s first instinct was to reassure him that they weren’t going to do anything, but Bruce was quick to speak.

“What’s your name?”

“I’m no one.”

“Do you even know your name?”

Jason raised an eyebrow. “That’s a weird one.”

“Then answer my first question.”

Jason scowled but told him, “I’m X.”

“Wrong answer, Todd,” Damian said quickly.

Jason rolled his eyes. “You guys keep calling me Jason or Todd. I’m just X.”

Tim, who had crutch-paddled his way back over to the computer, confirmed, “Your DNA is a match for Jason Todd. You’re Jason. There’s no questioning it. Huh?” Tim suddenly pulled up something on the main screen. “Batman, you need to see this.”

Bruce hurried over. “What is this?”

“I pulled the video feeds from Janus Cosmetics’ servers initially, but Black Mask blocked me out. Well, now there’s this old video file that he left without security titled: PRESENT4BAT.” He opened the video and the image that came up on the screen made everyone fall silent again.

It showed the Red Hood being strapped onto a surgical table while unconscious. He had been stripped of his weapons, jacket, and armored shirt, but the helmet was still on his head. His chest was littered with dark bruises and bloody cuts as if he’d been put through the ringer for days. The only reassurance was that his chest was still rising and falling with his breathing. The helmet was finally removed once Jason was thoroughly bound to reveal his face without his domino mask.

Dick sucked in a scream. Jason’s left eye was hanging out of the socket, a bloody mess on his bruised face.

Apparently there were more straps. One was secured snugly around his forehead and the other secured too tightly around his neck. The sudden pressure woke him up and he began gasping in air in a panic. His right eye was bloodshot and glazed over like he had been drugged. There wasn’t much give with his binds, so he remained mostly still aside from his labored breathing and his right eye searching the room in a daze.

[Welcome back, Hood. I must say, you’ve looked better.]

Jason’s eye stopped, landing on someone behind the camera. [Fuck you, Roman.]

[We can save that for another time. Today is a special day. Today your suffering finally comes to an end.]

The Jason on screen gave a choked chuckle. [Finally going to kill me then? It’s about time.]

Dick fell backwards and shook his head. “I can’t watch this.”

“Clearly he’s not dead,” Damian noted, pointing to X, who was watching the screen with growing curiosity.

[Today you’re going to make a choice. You can either tell me who the Batman really is, or you can become my employee.]

Jason scoffed. [So, I tell you and you’ll let me leave like this, or I don’t tell you and I get to work for you? Sorry, but I don’t see any reason to work for that ugly mug, so unless you’re going to hypnotize me or threaten something I actually care about—spoiler alert, there’s not much—then I don’t see how or why I’d work for you.]

[Consider wisely. I have no plans for mind control, but you’ll find that it is in your best interest to tell me who Batman is.]

[This is a no-fucking-brainer. You’re not getting a name out of me. You haven’t for the last month. Why would I crack now that you’ve got a job offer?]

[Fine then. Just remember that I offered you an alternative. Proceed, Doctor.]

The man in a white lab coat who had strapped Jason in suddenly tightened the neck strap again. Jason’s mouth fell agape just long enough for the man to secure a rubber gag between his teeth. [To make sure you don’t bite off your tongue. Not sure if the virus will grow that back, after all.]

Jason sputtered through the gag, his labored breaths greatly slowed now that the strap around his neck was tighter. The doctor retrieved what looked like a large nail and a hammer and positioned the nail inside of Jason’s left eye socket.

X x X x X

Batman and X continued to watch on as the others all had to turn away the moment the loud CRACK could be heard.

Jason Todd had been lobotomized. The doctor set his tools aside when it was over, undid the strap around Jason’s neck, and removed the gag.

Jason was still. A bit of blood and drool pooled in his mouth. His chest still moved. He was alive, but for all other purposes, he was gone.

Boss finally walked into view of the camera and, speaking to no one in particular, said, [Such a shame he wouldn’t talk. If the damned kid would have had even a shred of documents as to his own identity it might have been enough to figure out who the Bat really is. But instead this ungrateful little fuck practically doesn’t exist!]

Nightwing shuddered. X took notice but was unaware of how Jason’s status had led to him not having enough information to provide any real leads on his connections.

[Time to fix him up, then. This will be interesting, to say the least. Commencing Techno-Organic Virus first human trial.] Boss took a small dropper and dropped the familiar silver liquid directly into Jason’s eye socket, his other eye, his mouth, and a few of the open wounds on his chest. Miraculously, Jason’s body righted itself. His left eye even pulled back into place. The doctor quickly went about undoing the straps holding Jason down. When you couldn’t even tell that he’d been injured, Jason sat up and looked around curiously. [Hey there, son. You feeling okay?]

Jason just stared.

[Can you tell me your name?]

He only blinked in response.

[I found you. You were pretty beat up. You’re lucky it was me who found you, actually. My company has been developing a sort of wonder cure. We were able to make you as good as new. Maybe even better.]

Jason stared at his own hands like they were foreign objects before muttering, [Thank you…Sir.]

And the video finally cut out.

“You thanked him…for lobotomizing you,” Robin breathed.

X winced and panted, suddenly red faced and sweating. “I don’t…remember…nngh.”

Red Robin gasped and pulled up the other feed, the one playing out now in real time from X’s eyes.

*Get me their names. Report in, NOW. Acknowledge, X, or face punishment!*

“Shit! Sorry! I’m pushing out his controls now!” Red Robin typed so fast that X couldn’t even begin to keep up with the sound. He wished he could sit up further. See what was being written about himself, but the restraints on his wrists and the pain in his head kept him effectively trapped in place.

“Whoa. Mask had some extra measures programmed into him,” Red Robin suddenly explained. "Something that presses on the nerves in his head and something that cuts his consciousness completely. I need to deprogram those commands…”

X cried out, straining against his binds again as he writhed in pain. The older man nearby worriedly placed a cool towel on his forehead and pleaded with Red Robin to work faster.

“There!”

The moment that Red Robin exclaimed, X stopped writhing. He was breathing a bit labored, but already looking much better. He blinked a few times and said, “This is…different.”

Red Robin slumped back in his chair and Batman gave him an encouraging pat on the shoulder before returning to X.

“Your name is Jason Peter Todd. You went by Red Hood while working. You’re a longtime associate of mine.”

X scoffed. “Seems like that went well for me, huh?”

“You preferred to work on your own.”

“As what, an assassin?”

“No.” Batman grimaced. “No. You…you’re not an assassin.”

This made X curious. “With what I can do? I’m perfectly suited for the job. Did Jason really do something else?”

Robin clicked his tongue. “Hardly.”

“No. Jason was…you’re not an assassin,” Batman reitterated.

“I am most definitely an assassin,” X corrected. “Or a merc. Hired gun. Whatever you want to dress it up as. I kill and am paid for it.”

“But why?” Nightwing snapped. “Why would you do that? You were no one! You didn’t have to become his pet killer!”

X shifted uncomfortably. “I…wasn’t…at first. I was his assistant. A security guard at best. I didn’t mind working for him. He’d saved me. But then some guy tried to mug him and…I got in the way. I got hurt, but I managed to steal the guy’s gun. Boss had…Mr. Sionis thought the guy had gotten away, but I shot him from four blocks away. Right in the head. He saw my potential.”

“But you got hurt!”

X swallowed a lump in his throat and explained, “That…wasn’t something that he was happy with. He didn’t like me squandering the gift he’d given me. Said he couldn’t waste the Techno-Organic Virus on a single bullet wound.”

“Single?” Dick was already regretting his questions.

“He felt I would be better suited to working in the shadows. Making use of my marksman skills. And shooting a gun means that I’m likely to be shot at as well. So, he wanted to make sure that I was ready to feel that kind of pain. That I could push through it. He promised to use the virus when it was too much. I…I had thought that the first bullet was too much. My kneecap was destroyed. I didn’t see how some stupid virus was going to help me. I couldn’t see much past the pain. He didn’t like that, so he shot me again. The other knee. Then my elbows. My shoulders. My stomach…”

Nightwing was turning unnaturally pale. Red Robin even shuddered, trying hard not to look sickly. Robin, of all people, was appalled by the revelation of Jason’s treatment. “This is outrageous! We must put a stop to Black Mask! End him for his treachery!”

X exhaled deeply and added, “But he was right. After it all, I was still alive. I shouldn’t have caved so quickly to the pain. When he used the virus, I was better. He thanked me too. It helped him with testing the virus. He promised me that he would use it on me whenever I was injured on a job, but only if he could continue to test the limits of the virus. It…it can help the world, so who am I to complain?”

“But last time! Last time, that wasn’t testing the limits for the virus! That was—” Nightwing stopped himself. X’s eyes were wide with understanding. He knew. How could he know? How could Nightwing have seen what had happened to him? It was shameful. Disgusting. “Jay…”

“My name isn’t…What happened then…it wasn’t a…normal punishment.”

Nightwing was breaking down. Batman needed to put an end to this before his ward was left as an emotional wreck.

“Alfred, take Dick and Tim up for the evening. Make sure that they eat something and…bring down something for Jason as well. Damian and I will be up shortly.”

“X. I’m not Jason. You don’t have to pretend.”

“You’re not just X. Maybe you can’t remember, but—”

“Even if I was, the part of me that was wouldn’t have survived something like that. You’re a smart man, right? You know that.”

Batman’s jaw set. “This isn’t something that can’t be undone. We will help you. But you need to cooperate.”

X let his head rest against the tiny pillow and shrugged. “Yeah. What else can I do, right? No commands from my boss to worry about. No splitting headaches. I don’t really want to kill if I don’t have to.”

Batman nodded, somewhat encouraged by that. “Good. That’s…that’s good to hear.”

“Of course, I don’t expect a bunch of heroes to just let a killer like me walk out scott-free. Just know that I won’t go to Arkham. If you try to lock me up there, Boss won’t have enough virus to fix all that I do to those freaks. When you turn me in, make sure I go to Blackgate.”

“We’re not—”

“Give us a month,” Batman cut in. “One month to try to remind you of who you are. If we can’t do that, then you’re free to go wherever you want. Start your new life over with a clean slate. Not as Roman’s assassin, but as a free man.”

X tasted the idea and nodded again. “Deal, but only if I’m not strapped to this table the whole time.”

Batman undid the straps on X’s wrists, allowing him to sit up. He pulled his legs in out of habit and leaned his chin against his knees. There were minor bruises from when he had first pulled against the straps, but nothing serious and the recent dose of the virus was already fixing them. He checked his chest. There was still a hole in his uniform, but the wound was closed. Everything was working properly. He wasn’t sure that he trusted Batman and the many birds he kept in his company, but the video of Jason Todd’s lobotomy was pretty damning.

Batman removed his cowl, revealing Bruce Wayne. X had already guessed, but the motion was appreciated. Bruce held out a hand and helped X off the gurney with a slight smile. “Welcome.”


	8. Nothing that Bacon Can't Fix

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> X allows Bruce to use his methods to try to bring out Jason Todd, all the while certain that the boy who was lobotomized no longer exists. An elder member of the Justice League tries his hand at restoring X's mind only to discover damage that has long since pre-dated his memory loss.
> 
> Dick would do anything to get Jason back, but forcing the worst of his own memories upon him proves to be too much for anyone to handle. Thankfully someone in the Manor has an alternative way to get through to him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another little reference in this chapter that goes back to my other story: Probation. Bully for anyone who catches it! This is a lighter chapter in the storm. Sorry for the rough sailing! We're not out of the woods yet, but it's going to be a little more lighthearted for a bit!

Bruce Wayne, Damian Wayne, Tim Drake, and Dick Grayson. X was baffled by how willingly they threw their real names at him. Their identities were supposed to be sacred. Some holy item that no evildoer would ever know. It crossed his mind that Black Mask might lessen punishment if the next time X showed up for a dose of the virus he had that information to drop.

Then, of course, there was the butler. X vaguely recognized the Englishman from the Wayne Gala. Polite. Neat. Doting. If Bruce Wayne was the foster father, Alfred was more like a genuine parent. He kept an eye on the boys and treated them with respect that, as far as X could tell, they simply didn’t deserve. Cooking, cleaning, caring, teaching, and watching over it all. Even if X were to hand Batman and his little bird family’s names over to Black Mask, he’d make sure that Alfred Pennyworth was safe. He swore that on the last bite of the fantastic plate of chicken cordon bleu that Pennyworth had fed him his first night there.

Wanting him to feel more like ‘Jason,’ Bruce had insisted that X stay in what was apparently Jason’s room at the mansion. It was hard to see what could be gleamed about his previous life from that room. Nothing on the walls, which were painted a deep red wine color that X could almost taste whenever he was in there. The only personal items were minimal clothes and an entire wall of books. That, at least, was something that he felt he could enjoy. It’s said that a lot can be said about a person based on their taste in books, but Jason’s collection was so vast that on a single shelf X couldn’t guess if Jason had been a manic depressant or hopeless romantic. On another shelf he found an entomology reference book placed ironically next to an etymology reference book. He liked to think that Jason did it on purpose even though seemingly no one else touched the books in that room.

It was a little impressive to see an entire shelf of Shakespeare in at least six different languages. Could Jason really understand that many? Maybe he was just a collector. X had picked up one of the books and, somehow, identified it as Portuguese. He read on and came to the conclusion that he just had basic high school understanding of Spanish or something and was able to gleam meanings because of the similarities between the two languages. He picked up another book off the shelf with Cyrillic letters on it. He was surprised with himself for being able to sound it out in his mind and identify the book as Cymbeline. A quick flip through it and he was no longer convinced that he knew any bit of the language it contained.

In the drawers and cupboards in the room there were traces of weapons that had been removed. X wondered if that was because they didn’t trust him, or if perhaps Jason himself had taken the weapons and left nothing behind.

He didn’t sleep that first night. Afraid of the nightmares of punishment sessions that might creep into his mind and uncomfortable with the unfamiliar surroundings, he picked up a book from the shelf—The Art of War—to calm his mind. It was a delightfully quick read, but he could sit for hours on each chapter, carefully trying to pick apart situations illustrated by Sun Tzu and how they could be applied to modern battlefields. When the sunlight crept in from the window he had read the book seven times. A soft knock on the door made him tense. He didn’t make a sound, just kept his eyes trained on the door.

“Jason?”

Nightwing—Dick Grayson—made X uncomfortable. He went about with a limp. He had a crutch that he ignored often. That limp served as a blatant reminder of X’s missed shot. The only time he’d taken a shot and missed. It was uncomfortable for him. A reminder of that mistake served as a reminder of the pain it had brought upon him. The acid. He clenched his right hand into a tight fist, making sure that it still worked. “No Jason here.”

“Right. Uh, there’s someone here to see you.”

“I didn’t think I’d have visitors here,” X said in an even tone. He couldn’t show concern. No weaknesses. He was in the lion’s den now. One wrong move could mess him up, and that would mean going back to his boss to face what would doubtlessly be the worst punishment to date.

“It’s a friend. He might be able to help with your head.”

“My head’s fine.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Do I?”

Dick sighed. “We’re just trying to help.”

X set his book aside and shrugged. “I’m here for the month, right? Do what you will.” He followed Dick back to the Batcave and was amazed to see a green man. “Uh, is it Halloween already?”

“Jason,” Bruce Wayne said, making his presence known, “this is J’onn. He’s a Martian.”

“My name is—”

“X. Yes. I see that. Your mind is…unsettled,” J’onn said stiffly. “If you are willing, I may be able to search your mind for anything that is below the surface.”

X didn’t like that plan at all. “That’s invasive. My thoughts are my own.”

J’onn already looked uncomfortable. Had he read X’s mind already? Did he know what he was thinking? How he viewed the Wayne family? He could be in danger. They could punish him for his thoughts. Roman certainly would have.

-These people are not Roman Sionis.-

X shuddered. The voice sounded like it came from his own head. He stared at the Martian’s red eyes fearfully and tried to slow his thoughts. “My mind is my own. You share my personal thoughts and I’ll kill you. Understood?”

“Jason, show some respect,” Bruce Wayne demanded.

“Tell me, Wayne. Would Jason have shown respect?” X wondered. That seemed to silence the Bat. “Now I don’t want to waste my whole day in a fancy mansion under a microscope. Let’s get this over with. I was looking forward to Mr. Pennyworth’s breakfast.”

“Don’t worry about that. Alfred’s making your favorite. He’ll make sure there’s plenty left,” Dick said.

X scoffed. “Tell me then. What’s my favorite?”

Dick blinked a few times. “M…maybe you’ll eat it and remember. I’ll…I’ll go wait in the dining room.” He excused himself and X felt a little bit of relief. He didn’t like how Dick tended to hover and worry over everything. It was disconcerting.

“It may be more comfortable if you're lying down,” J’onn suggested, gesturing toward the now freshened gurney. X wondered when Alfred had found the time to change the bloody sheets. He didn’t care to be forced back onto that gurney after he’d been bound to it the day before, so he just took a seat where he was. “Are you certain you are ready for this?”

“Like I said; reveal anything personal and I’ll figure out where Martian physiology can’t handle taking a bullet.”

“Jason—”

“It’s X. Now hurry up.”

J’onn didn’t seem concerned with X’s threats, which was a little reassuring and a little annoying at the same time. The Martian placed his hands on X’s head with a touch that was almost too gentle. -Close your eyes, X, and let me in.-

It was hard to resist that voice. He let his eyelids fall shut and took a deep breath. Images flashed through his mind. Memories of every kill, right down to that clumsy first time when he had taken out a mugger…

…no, that wasn’t right…

It was a rapist. He hadn’t shot the man either. He’d chased him. Tried to get to him. To fight him. Hit him. Hurt him. But why? Why was he chasing that man? When was this?

-Just breathe. Your memories can’t hurt you.-

That voice. It was grounding X. Bringing him back to reality. That chase. That man. It must have been a lie. His first kill was by an alley. The man had attacked Roman. Roman’s bodyguard had been stabbed. X had been able to take the hit in Roman’s stead. The feeling of the knife sliding between his ribs…was nothing compared to the feeling of the metal brand Roman had pressed over the wound when they’d returned to his office.

-My word…-

The searing pain. The melting of flesh. Again and again and again. The striking of metal to skin. The curve of the crowbar.

-Breathe. You have to breathe. Calm yourself.-

*Report in.*

Front hand or back hand?

“I…can’t…”

-Jason.-

*You are no one. No need to seek an identity when you know you were already cast aside. Cast aside your identity. The only face you need is what you have when in my service.*

“I…”

-Jason!-

This is what you get, Robi-poo. This is what happens to pretty little bird-boys who Batsy brings into our little game.

*Report in.*

-What is he seeing? J’onn! J’onn!-

*We can wreck you all we want and you’ll just be put right back together. Good as new.*

-Pull him out, J’onn!-

-He’s in too deep, Bruce! I…I can’t break him out of it.-

Something was wrong. The things that X was seeing…They couldn’t be real. No one could survive that sort of treatment. Who was that man? Men? Everything hurt. His head was swimming through tar. No, not swimming…sinking. Drowning.

“Help…”

-Jason? You have to focus. Don’t let it swallow you!-

He’s not coming for you, pretty-bird. Because in the end, you’re no one.

*You’re no one without me.*

You know what? I’m not even going to take your little mask off. Because who you are doesn’t even matter.

*I’m only giving you a mask so that people don’t remember your face. The only thing that’s important is your eyes. You don’t have a face. You’re no one.*

X.

X.

“JASON!”

Warmth. Pressure. Comfort.

“Please come back. Please.”

X opened his eyes and was confused. He was leaning forward. His chin was resting on someone’s shoulder. Strong arms were holding him. The scent of spearmint shampoo was soft. Stimulating. Adding a pleasant coolness to the comforting warmth.

“Come back to me, Jason.”

There it was again.

X pushed the person away. The force came with a strained grunt. Dick fell back and pressed his hand against the spot where he’d been shot. That stupid, stupid missed shot.

“He’s back.”

The Martian’s voice was grating. X got to his feet and within seconds had a hand wrapped around the green man’s neck. “The fuck did you show me?”

“Let him go,” Bruce demanded. “That’s an order.”

“An order?” X’s hand released only to snake out towards Bruce. The larger man caught him by the wrist, but wasn’t prepared for the hard knee that came up, nailing him in the gut. “You think you have power over me?”

“Jason!”

X was seeing red. All of the pain was still fresh on his mind. Every punishment. Every swing of the crowbar. “I’m not Jason!” he shouted. “I’m not Jason! Jason was a person! I’m not—”

“You’re everything,” Dick exclaimed. “You’re the world. You’re worth the world and more.”

Why did those words feel so good? It was sickening. “I’m not doing that again,” X growled. “Try anything like that and I’ll leave, and you’ll never see me again.” Was that a threat? Would that even work? X didn’t know where he stood. He just knew that he couldn’t handle the probe again.

“We will continue to do what we can to get a full assessment of your mental status,” Bruce had the gall to say. “That was the deal.”

X rammed his head up into Bruce’s face, breaking the billionaire’s nose before sweeping past him and back into the mansion. It was his plan to go right out the front door and never look back, but Alfred was in the entryway, apparently by sheer coincidence.

“Ahh, Master X. Care for some Bacon and French toast?”

The thought alone made him salivate.

First breakfast, then break fast.

“Lead the way, Jeeves.”

X x X x X

Dick was still on the floor of the cave, staring at Bruce and J’onn. J’onn looked dumbfounded. Bruce looked angry.

Dick smirked.

“Care to explain what’s funny, Dick?”

He tried to stifle it. “I…Oh man…”

“He’s far more broken than you led me to believe, Bruce. I thought this was a simple recovery. Find the pieces of his brain that belong to him. Repair some physical damage that had been done. What I found was not the mind of an injured man. It was the fractured psyche of a tortured child coupled with unusual training against telepathic probes.”

A wave of laughter overcame Dick and he leaned back, letting his head fall back, allowing his mirth to echo around the walls of the cave.

“Dick?”

“No. No, I’m sorry. It’s just…did you see him? He was all prickly! The moment he looked vulnerable he went for the throat!”

J’onn gave the faintest of a grimace. “I fail to see the humor.”

“That’s just how Jason is,” Bruce explained.

“He’s hotheaded, prickly, defensive, and always a flight risk,” Dick confirmed. “It’s like he’s finally come home.”

J’onn sighed. “I cannot begin to fathom your fractured family, Bruce. To find humor in what he has experienced is…”

“What did you see?”

It wasn’t often that the Martian was struck silent. “My family was lost long ago. My world taken from me violently. I alone survived. I have lived with that pain.”

“And?”

“Jason Todd has been living that hell in a loop from the day that his father left.”

It wasn’t often that Jason’s father was brought to anyone’s mind.

“The day he believed his mother had died still haunts him. The days he spent alone on the streets are still there. These things remain ever-present even in his damaged memories. After that all that he clings to is Black Mask and pain.”

Dick’s good-natured humor was gone. He awkwardly got to his feet and asked, “What did he go through?”

“Fire, ice, acid—”

“What?”

J’onn looked shockingly nervous. Could he be nervous? Dick had never seen the man so…shaken.

“Sex is something to be performed with loved ones,” J’onn muttered.

Bruce and Dick were both visibly shaken.

“We know that…that he was assaulted,” Bruce confirmed. “That’s not a loving action. That was rape.”

J’onn nodded slowly. “Yes. To have been through that so many times now…”

It was like Dick had been punched right in the gut. “Many…times?”

J’onn shuddered. “Not just at the hands of Black Mask and his men. There is some deeper trauma. I fear that Jason found dangerous ways to survive on the street before Bruce found him.”

Bruce sighed. “I’m aware of Jason’s history.”

Dick was going to be sick again.

“It would seem that these punishments that Black Mask puts him through are often of a sexual nature. This may have further damaged his already fragile psyche. There aren’t many pieces of Jason that I can reach.”

Before he could learn anything else, Dick was sprinting up the stairs, two at a time in spite of the pain. What was his pain? What was the damage compared to what Jason had been put through? He was back in the mansion, his heart racing. He bolted towards Jason’s room. Was the mansion always so big? He threw the door open. The bed was still unused. The book he’d been reading that morning was sitting on the shelf, returned neatly to its place. No sign that anyone had been there. No indication of life.

“He’s gone,” Dick breathed.

His heart felt like it was going to explode in his chest. He was back to running. He had to get help. Had to find Damian. Damian wasn’t hurt. Damian could pursue. Damian could bring Jason back.

Dick all but threw himself into the kitchen. The center island had the stools pulled out. Damian, Alfred, and Jason were sitting around it with plates of food.

“I demand you relinquish that morsel immediately!”

“Piss off, demon-spawn! First come first serve!”

“Now boys, I can happily make more bacon should the need arise. I just wish there were some way to better balance your meal.”

“Pennyworth, I’ll eat whatever you have to offer. You’re amazing.”

Dick felt like he could breathe again. Jason was right there. He was smiling. He was eating. He was so like himself…

“Hm? Master Dick! You look rather pale!” Alfred moved away from the island and fetched the orange juice jug from the fridge. Dick thought about all the times that Alfred used to catch Jason drinking right from the bottle and he started to tear up. “Master Dick, are you alright?”

“Yeah. Sorry. I thought…I mean…”

“He’s probably still pissed off about what I did to Bruce Wayne,” Jason said with a mouthful of French toast.

“What did you do to Father?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Dick said quickly, figuring it wasn’t a great idea to annoy Damian after the kid had been so trigger happy with Jason already. “I thought you’d left,” Dick admitted.

Jason scoffed. “Might have. But this man’s an artist and I’m a humble consumer of the arts. Whatever Wayne’s paying you, Pennyworth, I’d double it. Roman pays me more than enough. You’re all I’d need.”

“While I’m flattered, I’m afraid I cannot be bought.”

“Especially not with your dirty money,” Damian sneered.

“I earned every dime.” Jason didn’t seem all that put out. “And I’d show him more respect than a little monster like you ever could.”

The two of them resumed bickering while Alfred took care of Dick. “It’s somewhat calming to see them like this,” Alfred confessed quietly. “I would rather you all got along, but some things simply cannot be changed, and if that is true, I will happily accept seeing Master Damian and Master Jason healthily arguing any time.”

Dick stared at his glass of orange juice somberly. “We have to get him back,” he muttered. “How many times do we have to fail him?”

Alfred sighed deeply. “He is here, Master Dick, and that means that he is willing to try. Let us accept this as a step in the right direction. That he is even willing to try is remarkable.”

“Right…we need to do everything that we can to help him…I’ve got to make a call.”


	9. Shot for Shot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Recognizing that there hasn't been any progress with Jason, Dick calls in reinforcements to help bring back some memories.
> 
> What ensues is out of his control and may not be as helpful as he hoped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Roy FTW!!! If anything has come from DC's New 52 that I've truly loved it's the friendship between Roy and Jason! Go figure DC just loves to give me nice things only to TAKE THEM AWAY (yeah, I'm still bitter that my favorite speedster killed my favorite archer...).
> 
> Of course, staying true to my nature, even the fun is laced with angst. Here to break hearts now is the first reunion of Red-Arse since they split (according to this story's timeline)!

When Roy got the call from Dick, he thought he was joking. Jason Todd, an amnesiac? It was stupid. How could that guy let that happen again? After all the shit they’d been through because of the last time he decided to have his mind wiped, Roy wasn’t particularly excited by Dick’s request to see if his presence might bring something back. 

Then Tim sent the video.

Watching his best friend get lobotomized was difficult. To say that he and Jason didn’t always agree on things would be an understatement, and he’d been unable to face the guy since his relapse, but this? This demanded his attention.

But now, at the Wayne Manor, he felt like he was the wrong person to call. Jason was in the gym, masterfully executing acrobatic maneuvers on what was usually Dick’s favorite equipment while Tim watched from a wheelchair in the corner.

“Whoa, what happened to you?” Roy made the mistake of asking when he first saw Tim.

Tim grimaced and pointed at the acrobat who had just nailed what Roy would normally believe to be an impossible flip.

“Right. Jaybird’s not exactly the most pleasant person when he does know who he is.” Roy could pinpoint a few scars here and there from his own scraps with the guy, but to be stuck in a wheelchair… “So, I hate to ask, but how’s he doing? I mean, last time everything was pretty terrifying to him. He lashed out a lot but didn’t really know his own strength.” Jason hoisted himself up onto the balance beam and, without ever letting his feet touch the beam, he pulled himself up into a perfect handstand and began to lower himself at his elbows and slowly raise himself back up. “I’m going to take a wild guess and say he’s not overly meek this time around.”

“He can’t remember who he is, but he still is every bit as disciplined as he was. Without any connections to us and without that snarky attitude we love so very much, he’s just a living weapon. He can even go toe to toe with Bruce.”

Roy scoffed. “What do you mean ‘can even’? Jaybird’s been able to take down the Bat for a while. He just holds back a lot.”

Tim looked incredulous. “You’re funny.”

Roy shrugged. “Believe what you will. But Jaybird’s every bit as trained as the Bat and then some, and he’s not really one to make sure his opponent’s still breathing when all’s said and done.” Roy whistled loudly, getting Jason’s attention. “What’s up, Jaybird?”

Jason scowled, his blue-green eyes narrowing on Roy from his upside-down position. He turned slightly and lowered his feet to the beam, carefully righting himself before hopping off. “You’re the next method of accessing my memory then?” Jason picked up a nearby towel without ever taking his eyes off of Roy. “Well, you don’t look alien. No mind probing then? Guess that’s an improvement.”

Roy raised an eyebrow. “Probing? That stuff doesn’t work on you anyways.”

Tim groaned loudly. “What do you mean it doesn’t work on him?”

Roy shrugged. “He wasn’t much for explanations, you know. Just claimed something about tricks he learned from his time with the All-Caste.”

Jason scoffed. “Oh, so that was all a waste of time anyways? Cool. Good to know the Bat’s so organized,” he complained. “So, what’s your plan? Reach out to me with some touchy-feely nostalgia or something? I thought that’s what these idiots were already doing.”

Roy cocked his head slightly and crossed his arms. “I thought you didn’t have that rapier wit intact. Good to see you’re still an ass.”

“Ooh, this one’s got a pair on him. Wish I could remember you. You seem way less stiff than the Bats. Don’t think I caught your name.”

Roy frowned. “You really don’t know me?”

What good humor Jason seemed to have faded quickly. “Maybe you missed a memo, but Boss…Black Mask ripped out the part of my brain that was Jason. I’m X. These idiots are trying to prove something by thinking they can undo what’s been done. I’m humoring them because they broke Boss’…Black Mask’s hold over me.”

The way that Jason kept slipping up and calling Black Mask ‘Boss’ was concerning. “Well, Jaybird—”

“X.”

“—sure. X. Anyways, you and I were a team more recently. I think the hope is that, since we were closer than you were with these guys, I might bring something back.”

Jason finally let his eyes wander off and Roy felt a little less like a microbe under a scope. “Think about it. You and I have been through hell and back. I mean, we went to Tamaran together.” This didn’t seem to mean anything to Jason. “Okay, well what about the mimes? I feel like the mimes would be hard to forget.”

“Mimes…Plural. Why would anyone deal with a bunch of mimes?” Jason asked.

There was an overwhelming sense of sadness that washed over Roy. No, they hadn’t parted on the best of terms, but their partnership still meant the world to him. Even when it was at its worst…

“Look, I’m sorry I don’t know you, I guess.” Jason ran a hand through his sweaty hair in that way that Roy recognized. How could this man not be Jason? “How about we get to know each other again? There’s this bar I like. Let me buy you a drink.”

Roy curled his hands into tight fists at his sides. “I…I don’t think—”

“Come on. No one here will let me pay for anything.”

“X, I don’t think that’s what he means,” Tim tried to explain.

“Just because you don’t look a day over fourteen doesn’t mean the adults can’t have their fun. And I’m not exactly used to socializing. If I’m going to be here for a while, I might as well make the most of it.” Jason crossed his arms and smiled. “And I don’t know what it is, but I like this guy. Don’t think I caught your name.”

Roy felt like his chest was in a vice. Jason was right there. He was with the whole Bat-Family that had wanted for so long to take care of him. Everything about him was the same, but he didn’t even know himself.

“Harper. Roy Harper. You also knew me as—”

“Arsenal?” Jason snatched a water bottle and took a long drink.

“You…I mean…How?”

Jason shrugged and his familiar grin taunted Roy. “I’ve seen clips of most super heroes in the news. My eyes don’t miss things because people cover their noses and cheek bones. The way that you carry yourself. You’re the leader of that Iron Rule group that went missing a while back.”

And that was more than he could take.

“Yeah. I could use a drink. I’ll get an Uber out here. What’s the name of the bar?”

Jason nodded slightly and stripped out of his shirt. “Stacked Deck. Give me five minutes to shower and change. I’ll meet you in the entryway.”

Roy gave a half smile. “You got it.”

***

Dick found Tim crunching numbers in the first-floor office and decided to check in. “Hey, have you seen Roy?”

Tim glanced up, looking more exhausted than usual. “Oh, you mean X’s new bestie? The fuck is their deal anyways?”

Dick was taken aback. “The hell happened? Did he remember Roy?”

“He pegged Roy’s alter ego the moment the guy got close and claimed that, for whatever reasons, he felt comfortable around him.”

“That…okay that’s a little concerning, but otherwise it sounds like Roy did a pretty good job. Even if it looks like nothing, even a little connection could—”

“Then Jason took Roy out for a drink.”

“WHAT!?”

“I tried to stop it, but somehow I was made out to be the bad guy.”

Dick caught Tim by the shoulder and forced him to spin around in his wheelchair. “Tim, Roy’s an addict!”

Tim dropped his head into his hands to keep from looking at Dick. “Before you get pissed, realize that you left the guy who can’t walk to keep track of a notorious addict and an assassin who have previously worked together as vigilante mercenaries. How the hell was I supposed to slow them down?”

Dick groaned, accepting that there was nothing to be done. But it didn’t make him any less worried. “Sorry. But I have to stop them. Do you know where—”

“Stacked Deck. Address is in the Camaro’s GPS already. They’ve been gone for a half hour. I…didn’t think it would be smart to send Alfred after them. I don’t trust those two to not be violent when drunk.”

Dick nodded, understanding that in spite of his short-comings, Tim was more prepared than anyone else could have hoped to be. He hurried out to the garage, hopping into Bruce’s favorite Camaro (all the while wondering why Tim didn’t choose a less conspicuous car, but grateful that he didn’t pick a motorcycle). He followed the directions, speeding as much as downtown traffic in Gotham allowed, and found himself at the same bar where he’d accidentally encountered Jason before. At least he felt comfortable there, though he was a little quietly embarrassed for not recognizing the place by the name when Tim had said it.

Stepping inside, Dick was greeted with a rather cartoonish scene.

Roy had just thrown the last of six darts into the old dartboard, nailing the center point with every single piece of ammo he’d been given. The other people in attendance hooted and hollered, rooting for him in spite of what seemed like a lack of competition.

Jason proudly slapped him a high five and pushed a shot of something towards him. The two of them crossed their arms around each other’s and downed the shots, hissing and smiling once it was gone.

“Admit it, X-Wing. You’ve lost. There’s no way you can top that,” Roy exclaimed, already ordering another drink which Bea was happy to pour. “You can’t top the master marksman!”

Jason scoffed and snatched the green trucker hat right off of Roy’s head, placing it on his own with the bill twisted around towards his back. “Tell you what. I’ll beat you with only one dart.”

The whole bar oohed at the declaration.

“Roy!” Dick limped over to his old friend, worried out of his mind by what he was witnessing. “You were supposed to help him, not…not relapse!”

“Ah, Cutie-Pie! What can I do for you tonight? Tonight’s drinks are on our resident bookworm, plus he and his friend are giving everybody a show!”

Dick reached over the register, snatching Jason’s black card and replacing it with his own. “Drinks are not on him. Jay, this kind of thing makes you easily traceable. And Roy, I can’t even begin to list off where you’ve screwed up!”

Roy pursed his lips goofily before gasping. “Ooh! I’ll bet you the usual penalty! If you can beat me with one dart in spite of Dickwad’s lecturing, I’ll drink it. But if you don’t, it’s all on you!”

The corner of Jason’s mouth quirked up into a confident smirk and, for the first time since he’d claimed the name X, Dick couldn’t help but think how much he looked like himself

“You’re on, Carrot-Top.” Bea kissed a black dart before handing it to Jason, who took three steps back from where Roy was throwing. The bar fell silent, save for Dick.

“You guys aren’t listening to me! This ends now! I’m taking you both home!” He grabbed Jason’s right shoulder only to get shrugged off. To make it a little more showy, Jason let go of the dart with his right hand, caught it in his left, and threw it with more force than Roy had used, successfully knocking the rest of the darts off of the board upon impact. Unfortunately, his own dart didn’t stick, and they all dropped to the floor.

“Yes!” Roy punched both of his fists into the air, pronouncing his victory. “Suck it! Yeah! I knew Dick’d screw you up! Boom! Penalty! Penalty!”

To Dick’s horror, the rest of the bar joined in Roy’s chant.

Jason groaned, but this seemed less hostile and more playful than usual. “You heard them, Bea.”

Bea smiled and looked at her shelves. “One Seven Seas coming right up!” Dick watched with his mouth ajar as she proceeded to pick up 7 mismatched bottles of liquor, pouring a shot of each into a shaker over ice. When she was done she shook it and strained it over a tall glass, pushing the gut-wrenching concoction over to Jason.

“A loss is a loss,” Jason said with a shrug. He held the glass up and everyone cheered loudly, holding their glasses up in solidarity before he tilted his head back.

“Jay!” Dick shouted in protest.

“Show ‘em how it’s done, X-Wing!”

Jason didn’t even stop to breathe. His Adam’s apple bobbed with each gulp, and in no time the glass was empty. He pressed a fist to his mouth as he let out a rather bubbly burp to the sounds of excited cheers.

Dick shuddered and looked to Bea. “The fuck is in a Seven Seas?”

She winked at him and said, “It’s short for the first seven things the bartender sees. It takes a solid pair of cajones to handle something like that.”

“Please. Cash out on my card. Party’s over. I’m taking these idiots home.”

Bea pouted a little but did as she was told. The bar attendees booed, but no one was going to argue with the guy buying them all drinks. “Come on, Tweedle-Dumb and Tweedle-Dumber. I’m parked around back.”

Roy threw his whole weight against Dick, sweeping him into a headlock that nearly dropped him right there. “Whoa. I thought I was unsteady. You been drinking too, Dickie-Boy?”

Dick struggled to keep some composure in spite of the pain. Jason pulled Roy’s free arm over his own shoulders and eased the weight off of Dick, though the motion almost knocked both himself and Roy over in the process. “Not drinkin’, Gingersnap. I shhhh…” Jason giggled as he held a finger up to his lips. He cupped Roy’s cheek and pulled his head unnecessarily closer, so that his lips brushed against Roy’s ear as he whispered, “I shhhot him.”

For a guy who looked like a human fireball, Roy blanched rather dramatically at that revelation.

“S’cool. I missed. Which izzz weird. I don’ miss.”

Roy tried to laugh it off. “You wouldn’t shoot Dickie-Bird. Get real.”

Dick winced again as Jason slapped his hand over the spot where he’d been shot. “S’real! Look! Loook!”

Dick had to fight with Jason to keep his clothes on right. “Cut it out! You’re a real pain like this.”

Jason seemed miffed by Dick’s resistance, but gave up, allowing himself to be led out and around to the Camaro. The boys laid him down across the back seat and Roy settled into the passenger seat up front.

“He…shot you?”

“He’s done worse while still fully aware of himself,” Dick pointed out as he started the car. The engine purred and Jason moaned in the back. “Roy, what were you thinking? If Jason knew what he was doing, taking you to a place like that, he’d never forgive himself!”

Roy didn’t seem ready to face his mistakes. “I did try to see if I could find any part of Jaybird. But lobotomy, Dick? You’ve lucky he’s here at all.” He looked back at Jason and sighed. “It’s like he’s been reborn again, but this time he’s a coldblooded killer.”

“We’re trying to help him.”

Roy nodded. “Yeah. I think it’s getting through a little.”

This made Dick curious. “What makes you say that?”

“Well, back at the bar the only thing that reminded me of Jaybird was his aim and his style. The way he spoke felt…wrong. Plus, Jaybird would never let himself get that drunk publicly. Used to say it ‘showed weakness.’ I mean, I know part of it was also solidarity for me, but I’ve really never seen him like that.”

Jason moaned again when there was a minor bump in the road.

“But most importantly, he didn’t kill you.”

Dick tensed, feeling his injury.

“It’s just a little thing, but if Jaybird really is acting as an assassin and he had you in his crosshairs, you’d be dead. No doubt in my mind. And yet you’re here. So, something kept him from killing you.”

“You heard him,” Dick brought up, “he just missed.”

Roy pulled his trucker hat down to hide his eyes a little and leaned back in his seat. “You and I both know he’s too good to just miss. You make him hesitate. It’s a good thing. Means there’s still some Jaybird in there. But…I don’t think X-Wing’s a bad guy.”

“X-Wing…Seriously?” Dick shook his head. “He’s still Jason.”

“And Jaybird and I have always been a little too friendly with the pet-names. It’s okay. Calling him that helped me to bond a bit. I think he trusts me.”

Dick sighed. “Roy, I don’t want you around him if you’re just going to let him drag you off the wagon.”

Roy shrugged. “I get that. But he’s my friend too.”

“He’s my brother, Roy. He’s family.”

Roy grimaced at that statement. “I don’t know that I’d go that far. He had some bonding time with Timbers and, much as Damian can be a little shit, he’s always felt a connection there because of his time spent at the League of Assassins. But you?”

“Me what, Roy?”

“You were the Golden-Boy. The big ideal. The perfect Robin. He used to say it was nearly impossible to live in that shadow.”

“He was his own Robin. Without him Batman would have—”

“Batman would have had you. He always knew that.”

“I left Gotham. I had to get away. I—”

“You always come back, Dick. And Jason was compared to you with every move that he made. He learned all of your circus routines. Studied your every move. It wasn’t easy either. I mean, body-mass-wise, you two aren’t exactly the same. And he grew up running around the street, not swinging around the circus.”

“But…”

“I’m not trying to make this any harder for you, I’m just trying to tell you that you were never a brother to him. Maybe stop trying so hard to play one now.”

That wasn’t an easy thing to ask of Dick. Roy had to know that. But if it meant helping Jason, he was willing to try anything.

Right?

“Thanks for…for trying,” Dick finally said as they pulled up in the garage of the Manor. “Next time he tries to make you drink, though, do me a favor and don’t.”

“Yeah, sorry. It just kind of hit me really hard to see him like that. Didn’t mean to freak you out that much.”

“And go ahead and apologize to Tim too, while you’re at it. Now let’s get sleeping badass up to his room.”

The two of them were barely enough to get Jason out of the car. His body was completely limp, and he was bigger than both of the boys. But they managed to get him through the main hall and up the stairs and finally into his room. Upon dropping him on his bed, Jason chuckled. “You’re cute. Big tough guys. Hmph.”

“Whoa!” Jason’s legs wrapped around Roy’s waist and pulled him down onto the bed. “X-Wing, the hell’s happening here?”

“Mmm right here. S’okay. I know you won’t hurt me.”

Dick and Roy both cringed.

“No one here’s going to hurt you. You know that,” Roy said softly, pushing Jason’s bangs up to press a hand against his forehead.

“I don’ know nothin’. But I…want you to stay. I know Gingersnap. I trust Gingersnap.” He smiled goofily. “Gingy, you smell like sin.”

Roy cleared his throat. “X-Wing, this isn’t a good idea.”

“Sin sin sinamum…Mmm.”

Roy stared at Jason’s sleepy face lovingly. “I…That’s because of the fireball, idiot…”

“There’s…there’s been some instances of sexual abuse,” Dick explained sadly.

Roy scoffed. “Again? Just what is it with you, Jaybird?”

Dick felt like he’d just been slapped. “The fuck are you talking about?”

“Oh. Don’t worry about it. He never liked talking about his time before Batman. He’d kill me for even saying that.”

Before Batman? Dick knew very little about Jason’s life before Batman. The kid who stole a few tires off of the most notorious car in Gotham was a famous story in the Cave. The same kid who attacked the Joker in order to save the Bat. That kid was who Dick knew.

“Look, you can stay nearby if it helps, but…I’m going to stay here tonight. I…I just think…I think he could use the warmth.”

Dick’s heart ached looking at the two of them. Dressed casually and reeking of booze; Roy’s hat had fallen off when he hit the bed and his fiery red hair was splayed out behind him as he laid on his shoulder, still stroking Jason’s face. Jason was curled in on himself, but the more that Roy touched his hair the more he inched his way over until his head was tucked just under the archer’s chin. Dick felt inexplicably jealous at the scene. Roy was able to show Jason these small affections and he didn’t shy away from them or meet them with scorn. Was that how they always were? No wonder Jason enjoyed working with Roy. Why couldn’t Dick offer him this sort of comfort?

Was…was that really what he wanted to offer his brother?

“I’ll bring you guys some water,” Dick decided, no longer feeling welcome in that room. He stepped outside and rubbed his eyes as he shut the door.

“Hey, you find them then?” Tim wheeled himself over.

“Oh…yeah. Yeah, they’re both pretty out of it. Especially Jason,” Dick mumbled, still trying to fix his face.

“You uh…You okay?”

“You think of me like a brother, right?”

Tim scoffed. “Brother complex kicking in again? You can be pretty needy sometimes, you know that?”

Dick was affronted, but he managed a smile. “I’m not that bad.”

“You’re so that bad. I watched you cry when Damian said you were nothing more than a meddling associate of his father.”

“Yeah well…that one kind of hurt.”

“And you just about cried when I asked you to stand in for Bruce at a parent teacher conference a while back.”

Dick scratched his head. “Okay, so family means a lot to me. But Roy doesn’t think Jay ever saw me as a brother.”

“He didn’t,” Tim said bluntly, nearly tripping Dick in the process.

“Ow. Okay. Elaborate please.”

Tim smirked. “Nah. I’ll let you suffer. It’s funnier this way.”

“You’re evil.”

“Kind of like an annoying little brother?”

“You suck.”


	10. Ruined Chances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time continues to pass until the deal is nearly up. Tensions rise as it becomes clear that X has no intentions of trying to recover his memory. Dick can't live with the thought of losing Jason again, but his concerns lead to a fatal mistake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay! The reprieve that was Roy has passed and it's about time to dive straight back into the angsty roots of this story!

“Geez. For what you guys claim is a means of achieving freedom, you sure act like a bunch of prison wardens,” Jason complained as he kicked his feet up on the dining room table. When Alfred cleared his throat loudly, Jason sheepishly righted his posture. “I tried to get to know Roy better and wound up chewed out for having a little fun. How was I supposed to know he was an alcoholic?”

Dick wanted to scream at him that the whole point was getting him to remember, but the last thing he wanted was to push Jason further away. As things were going, their efforts of getting Jason back to the way that he was were proving fruitless. Even with his mind in disarray, he had certain telepathic blocks in place. Even with his memory gone, he was every bit as skilled as normal. This unattached Jason…he was dangerous. Dick couldn’t help but worry that, if they couldn’t bring him back, Bruce would have to have him locked away in Blackgate.

Or worse…Arkham…

“It’s not like you’re trying all that hard,” Tim muttered. It had been a few weeks since Roy had been around, and Tim’s ankle had healed enough that he was no longer stuck to a wheelchair, but he was still notably bitter about the wound that Jason had given him.

Jason shrugged. “I don’t honestly get why it’s important,” he admitted. “From everything I’ve heard, it sounds like your Jason was something of a handful anyways. So maybe he didn’t act strictly as an assassin, but now you’re affording me the opportunity to give that up. As far as I’m concerned, I’m your primed opportunity to start over.”

“Jason wasn’t always easy, but he’s family. You’re family,” Dick confirmed. “We’re not about to give up on you because you tell us to.”

“I’m not Jason, though. B- Black Mask,” he was still breaking the habit of calling him ‘Boss,’ “made sure of that. And believe me when I say you’re not about to get me down on a table to undergo anymore brain surgery. It’s hard enough knowing that it already happened once.”

“No one wants to force you to do anything, Jay.”

“It’s X. Just X. I don’t get why that’s so difficult for you,” Jason snapped.

“Why’s it so important that we don’t call you Jason?” Tim ventured to ask.

“It just feels like you’re asking me to be someone that I’m not. It’s irritating.”

Dick wanted to shake him. To tell him that he was acting exactly like Jason would have. Whether or not he could recognize himself, he was Jason Todd. But it never seemed to matter. He was letting them do what they wanted to try to bring his past back to the surface, but there was no effort on his end. He was more than happy to go on as he was.

And that hurt more than anything.

Over the course of the next week, their attempts didn’t seem to do anything but solidify the notion that X was going to remain as he was. Dick was exhausted. Tim was annoyed. Damian wasn’t overly helpful. In the end, it seemed like it was all for naught.

Dick kept reminding himself that they still had another week. One more week to get through to him. One more week was all it would take. They’d get him back. They had to.

Knocking on Jason’s door, Dick found it unusually open. He stepped inside and was horrified. It had been cleaned out. Bedding was folded neatly. Extra clothes were left on top of the dressers, also neatly folded. The bookshelf had all of its books returned to their proper place. It was clear that the person who had done this was readying for departure. “No.” Had he been too late? Was it all over?

Dick knew that the best way to search the Manor was to check the security cameras from the Batcave, so he took the nearest entrance and was surprised to find Jason down there, already busily deleting security footage.

“Jay!”

Jason rolled his eyes and looked over at Dick. “I swear we’ve been over this. My name isn’t—”

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“What’s it look like? We both knew this couldn’t last. If there’s no progress, Batman’s going to lock me away where the sun doesn’t shine. And, well, this has afforded me the opportunity to learn that I kind of like the sun. Or at least the moon,” he continued to delete footage in spite of Dick’s obvious outrage. “No harm no foul. I’ll be out of your guys’ hair and it’ll be like this never happened. Without Black Mask keeping a hold on me, I’ve got no reason to kill. I’ll look for a normal way to make money. Pave my own road, you know?”

Dick tackled Jason, knocking him into the Bat-Computer. “You’re not about to just walk out of here!”

Though he seemed to be caught off guard, Jason recovered quickly and put some space between them. “I’m sorry if you feel like Jason’s abandoning you, but it would be easier to just think of Jason as having died. I’m not Jason. It’s that easy.”

“I lost you once! I won’t lose you again!”

If Dick had calmed down for a moment, he might have seen the hesitation in Jason’s features. What Dick said had resonated with something dormant inside of him. For the first time since encountering any of Batman’s associates in the last month, he felt like maybe a part of him had been awakened.

But Dick was seeing red. He was too afraid to let go and knew that going easy on Jason wouldn’t work, so he went all out. One wingding launched at Jason, and while he stood in shock, still trying to process what Dick had said, he took the throwing blade to his right eye.

“N-no. No!” Jason was rightfully hysterical, but not for the reasons that most people would be. “You! You’ve ruined it! You’ve ruined me!”

Dick was horrified. “Jay! I…I’m sorry! Hold still! Please! I’ll get help!” He tried to grab Jason’s shoulders, but the now injured assassin twisted Dick’s hands painfully behind his back, wrenching them so hard upward that he threatened to pop the arms out of their sockets. “Jay!”

“You…You ruined everything,” Jason whispered in his ear.

“Jay, we can still help you!”

“There’s no helping me now…I…I’m broken…”

“You’re not broken! Please! Just—”

But Jason tossed Dick towards the cliff of the cave, snatched one of the Robin Cycles, and was gone before Dick could recover.

“No…No no no…” Dick pounded at the stone floor, tears dripping down his face. “Damnit!” He had to find Bruce. Had to tell Tim. He’d messed up. They needed to find Jason again before it was too late.

***

It had taken Tim three days of non-stop work to re-establish a link with Jason’s eye cameras. When the feed finally came up he hit the alarm and the whole Manor was in the Cave in no time, ready to face an emergency.

“Tim! You can’t misuse the alarm just because—”

“Look!” Tim snapped, cutting Bruce off quickly.

The feed on the monitor was shaky. It showed a solid white room and Black Mask.

[It’s good to have you back in the fold, X. Now get some rest. Tomorrow is your first mission. Fail me again and I won’t be so merciful.]

[Y…Yes…]

The feed tilted downward and Alfred gasped. Even Damian was shaken by what Jason was looking at. His own naked body was covered in blood. Blood pooled at his feet. Intestines rested in his shaky hands. His body slowly seemed to be absorbing them back into place as the Techno-Organic Virus did its job.

“Fuck…” Tim’s outburst summed up the horror in the Cave.

Bruce rubbed his temples. “Why would he go back? He knew what was in store for him there. Was one eye really so important to him?”

“X took a lot of pride in his eyes,” Damian pointed out. “I think, since Todd was already an annoyingly good shot, the Virus enhanced them even further. That’s how he managed so many impossible shots.”

“And X doesn’t feel he has many identifying features,” Tim added. “If he thought that he’d really lost an eye, he’d do whatever it took to get it back.”

Dick couldn’t breathe. He’d done this to Jason. Jason had said it himself. If not for Dick’s temper, Jason wouldn’t have gone back to Black Mask. He wouldn’t have been disemboweled alive. And this was three days after he’d gone missing.

“Dick!” Bruce tried to snap Dick out of his state of panic, but it didn’t help. Dick was hyperventilating. An absolute mess.

“Jay’s…I…I did this to him.”

“Dick, pull yourself together. Freaking out isn’t helping him. We have to be proactive. Black Mask has clearly raised the security on the connection to the cameras in Jason’s eyes. There could be more changes. We can’t charge in blindly…”

Bruce proceeded to formulate a plan with Tim and Damian eagerly hanging on his every word, determined to get their brother back. Dick, however, was still lost in his shock. “I did this…I did this…”

PING!

Dick flinched. No one else noticed because they were busy working out a plan, but his phone had gone off. He tried to ignore it. Tried to focus.

PING!

PING!

Dick took out his phone, ready to throw it into the abyss of the cave, but the notification was from an unknown number. He checked it and nearly screamed.

[If you’re watching the feed, it’s behind by two hours.]

Someone knew. Someone—

[Meet with me. You owe me that much.]

Dick covered his mouth.

[The second street alley next to Janus Cosmetics.]

It was Jason. Dick knew it. He looked up at the monitor. The Jason on the screen was mostly recovered now, but still shaky. Sobbing quietly. If this really was Jason, Dick owed him more than anything he could offer. “I…have to go.”

That got the others’ attention.

“Now?” Bruce asked.

Dick nodded. “I need…I need to clear my head,” he decided to claim. “Just…just ten minutes. I’m not going to be helpful as I am.”

Bruce sighed. “Be careful out there. We will get Jason back.”

Again, he nodded. “I know. I’ll be right back.” He hopped on his motorcycle and was out.


	11. Just Another Betrayal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> X carries out his mission, hoping beyond hope that success will earn him at least a break. Seeing Dick again threatens to unearth hidden feelings in X, but given the circumstances he sees no reason to explore those feelings. After all, if Boss wants him, it's not likely that Dick will ever be the same...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter, I know, but it's a sort of interlude into what is basically gonna be a torture fest. Take this chapter as a warning. What comes next is not for the faint of heart or weak of stomach.

*Your friends have hacked this feed again, but what they’re seeing is two hours behind.*

X swallowed hard. He’d just changed into his uniform. He knew this was coming. “Yes sir…”

*Your next mission is to bring me Nightwing, incapacitated but alive.*

Unusual mission, but he wasn’t going to question it. Roman had made sure X never questioned his authority ever again.

*You have two hours. Don’t disappoint me.*

The last part of the message made X shudder. Three days of unending torment and he wasn’t even allowed more than a quick moment’s rest. Roman didn’t care anymore. Why should he? X had proven that his loyalty lied with the Virus and that was it. There was no reason for Roman to give him special treatment, not anymore.

Two hours wasn’t much time, but understandably, after that point, the Bats would see the message in the feed and he’d be made.

It was time to trust in Dick’s attachment to him.

He had saved Dick’s phone number to his work phone. No one had known he still had it while he was at the Manor, but it was the only way that he could contact Roman if the need for the Virus arose. Now that the situation had passed, it had its other uses.

He sent one message to Dick, trying to explain how he could send a message without their knowing, then another to strike at Dick’s guilty conscience. The last message he sent gave a location. All he could do after that was wait. He kept his head visible. If he was in full uniform, Dick would be suspicious. But the alley where they were to meet had a back doorway that would let them into the building. No need for formalities. Not that he’d been given a suit now. He’d be lucky if Roman let him leave the building without express permission ever again.

X pressed his hand over his stomach carefully. The memories still haunting him. Roman had taken a hook, sliced him open, and hung his intestines from the ceiling before telling him to move forward. The pressure from his own organs sliding out of him was indescribable. It hurt, but it also felt strange. He’d thought he was going to die. With each step he was more certain, but after making it halfway across the room, Roman had stopped him.

PING!

X checked his phone.

[On my way.]

Dick had taken the bait. That was good. That would make this easier.

He tucked his guns into their holsters and bit his lip. Too obvious. He looked threatening. Why would Dick let him anywhere close if his intentions were so clear?

He took the holsters off and tucked one gun into the back of his pants. That at least kept it concealed. It was time to face the music. He’d messed up when he let himself be seduced by the offer of help from Batman. Now he had to pay for his mistake.

X felt that familiar pang of guilt when Dick pulled up on his bike in the alley where they’d promised to meet. The young man cut the engine and took off his helmet, tossing it aside like it was nothing. If he’d only known, maybe he’d have kept it on. X tried to swallow his feelings. Burying them deep under the white-hot rage over what this man had done to him. What he’d allowed to happen.

Even though it wasn’t really his fault.

But Dick Grayson was the reason that he was back here. Dick Grayson was the reason why Roman had X under his thumb again. No. He was Roman’s tool before. Now? He was nothing. He may as well have been a means for the owner of Janus Cosmetics to pass the time. Whatever treatment Dick was going to receive, X had to believe he’d earned it.

“Jay…you’re eye…”

X’s jaw set. “Fixed. Good as new. Like it never fucking happened.”

For some reason, Dick looked wounded by just the acid in X’s voice. That didn’t bode well. If getting yelled at made him shrink away, he’d never survive whatever Roman had in store for him.

Dick bit his bottom lip. “What…what did Black Mask do to you?”

X wanted to scream. He wanted to press all of the memories down into the darkest pits of his brain where Jason Todd had been left. He didn’t want to remember any of it, but it was all there, like a bad taste that just wouldn’t leave his mouth.

“You ever been water-boarded?” It was hardly a surprise when Dick nodded. Nightwing likely had been through a few forms of torture over the years. Had Jason been through it all before as well? Would that have helped? X couldn’t imagine it ever would. “Well, imagine that but with boiling water.” He could feel it again as he spoke. “Imagine how your skin bubbles against the heat while your lungs are scalded, all before you’re ruthlessly fucked down the throat by men who are mad enough to choke you out even though you already can’t breathe!”

Why was he telling Dick this? Everything he said just made the young man break down a little more. It made him apologize again and again like a broken record. It was pathetic.

“That was just day one.”

Dick reached out to X and something snapped in his head. This man. This idiot. He’d ruined everything. It was all Grayson’s fault. If not for Grayson…

X wasn’t even sure when he’d pulled out his gun, but he had it pressed against Dick’s forehead in no time. He had to calm down. If he wasn’t careful, he was going to kill Dick, and that wasn’t the mission. Killing Dick would put the hero out of his misery, but it wasn’t what Roman had demanded of him.

“Jay—”

“Just shut up! My name is X! For fuck’s sake! You had a whole fucking month to get that straightened out in your head.”

Dick didn’t look afraid, just sad. “I won’t give up on you.”

Again, Dick was the same idealistic bastard who had been tormenting X all this time. It was time to end it. “I have a mission,” he ground out. “I can either take you in the easy way, or I can drag you in with another bullet hole to heal from. Choose fast. I won’t be punished again for your sorry ass.”

Dick looked crushed, but he kept his hands at his sides and actually leaned against X’s gun. “I won’t fight you. Do what you have to.”

More than anything, X wanted to pull the trigger. But even if it wasn’t against his mission parameters, something inside of him knew he wouldn’t. The same little instinct that made him miss the kill shot before wouldn’t let him blow Dick Grayson’s brains all over the alleyway. A twisted part of X wanted to find that quiet instinct and smother it as well, but it wouldn’t change anything.

“Turn around,” he mumbled. Dick did as he was told, and X pressed the barrel of the gun into the small of his back. His body loosened a bit. This shot wouldn’t kill Dick. It would paralyze him, sure, but he’d be alive. For whatever reason, he was okay with that, so he knew that he couldn’t be that attached to the guy. “There’s a door by the dumpster. We’re going there. Try anything funny and you’ll never be known as a Flying Grayson again.”

Dick didn’t say a word. He let X lead them to the back door. X stared at a retinal scanner and, upon it unlocking, demanded that Dick open the door and go inside. What few employees that saw them on the lower floor recognized X and didn’t dare interfere with them, knowing full well that Roman didn’t take kindly to people questioning his personal business and anything regarding the assassin was a few steps beyond personal. X didn’t bother with an elevator in spite of how high they were to go. Roman’s office was at the top floor, but there was no reason to rush this when they were already making good time.

“He’ll come for us,” Dick muttered as they made it to about the half-way point in the stairwell. “You know he’ll come for us.”

Given the time shown on the clocks as they passed, there was still a full hour before the feed that Bruce and the others were watching would even show his latest mission, and one hour was more than enough time for Roman to make Dick wish he were dead. “It won’t matter,” X said. “He’ll never make it in time.”

Something about those words stung in X’s chest, but he swallowed that too. No reason for emotions now. He’d hand Dick over, return to his room, and finally be allowed to rest. Maybe if he was good for Roman, if he performed mission after mission without a hitch, he’d regain some favor and be allowed a few liberties again.

“When he rescues us, he’ll never let this sort of thing happen to you again.”

That stinging feeling suddenly felt like fire. “There’s nothing he can do for me. If he manages to get you out of here, don’t ever look back. That’s the only way you’ll get past this.”

“I won’t leave you.”

“If Boss doesn’t get what he wants from you, it’ll be my head on the chopping block. He won’t kill me. I’m…I’m an asset. He’ll do everything but kill me. But if he asks me to find you again, I won’t stop until I’ve hunted you down. So, if he comes for you—if he rescues you—get far away from here. Because if you’re anywhere that I can find you, you will suffer.”

“Jay, don’t you hear yourself? You don’t want to do this!”

“I don’t have a choice. You took that from me.”

Dick kept his head down at that point, letting X lead them up in silence. When they finally reached the top floor, the men who had been involved with many of X’s punishments were waiting in the hall. They whistled as he passed with Dick in tow. He felt himself shake and hated that he was betraying his fear.

“I don’t think even Batman would fault you for killing this trash,” Dick mumbled under his breath. Maybe he meant to show solidarity or understanding, but it just reminded X that Dick knew what these men had done to him. He’d witnessed the lowest moments of X’s life.

“Shut up and keep walking. The sooner this is over with, the sooner I can wash my hands of you and that fucking prison you guys kept me in.”

“We can still help you.”

“You just don’t get it. You could never help me. You only delayed the inevitable.” X pushed open the door to Roman’s office and shoved Dick forward. “There. Mission complete. Now can I—”

“I say when the mission’s complete, boy!” Roman’s booming voice made X take a startled step backwards. “Your mission was to bring me Nightwing—”

“And here he is!” X protested, gesturing towards his willing hostage. “Yours to do whatever you want with!”

“Shut up!” Black Mask pulled out his own gun and shot X in the left thigh. X yelped like a whipped dog but didn’t dare fight back.

“You bastard!” Dick snapped, but Roman trained the gun on X again, which seemed to stop him where he stood. “He did what you asked!”

“His mission was to bring you to me incapacitated,” Roman said with a devious smile.

X, in a state of alarm, realized his mistake. Without a moment’s hesitation, he shot out both of Dick’s knees from behind, dropping the man to the floor, shouting in shock and agony.

“I’m sorry!” X said immediately after, casting his gun to the side to show his docility. “He-he was being agreeable. I didn’t even—”

The door opened and the men from the hall entered the room. The largest one grabbed the back of X’s uniform and sliced downward with a hunting knife, tracing the tip of the blade just over his spine. “Just couldn’t resist another day of play, eh boy?”

X looked to Roman pleadingly. “No…I’m sorry! I completed the mission! Please!”

“D…don’t fucking…touch him,” Dick growled out from the floor. He struggled to sit up in spite of his new injuries. It was hard to appear threatening in that position.

“No exceptions, son. You know the rules.”

Fear consumed X as the other men held him in place. The bullet wound in his leg was all but forgotten. His heart was racing fast enough that he could feel his pulse in his ears. He knew what was coming. He’d messed up. In spite of all promises that he’d made to himself, he’d failed again…

…and failure meant punishment.


	12. Witness to Evil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Black Mask has his men work Jason over while Dick is forced to watch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Return of the disclaimer! Yeah. Uhh, once again:
> 
> WARNING! GRAPHIC DEPICTIONS OF RAPE IN THIS CHAPTER! VIEW AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION!
> 
> Black Mask is all about victims' active participation in torture. You're warned now: it gets more graphic with the next chapter. The torture just takes a less sexual nature.

Dick recognized the three frighteningly large men from the video feed where Jason had been raped. Now, seeing those men holding Jason, stripping him, and licking their lips as they fondled him right in front of Dick, it was too much.

“Stop! Please!” He tried to crawl over to Jason, but his legs were useless to him. The pain was unbelievable. Jason had shot him so suddenly that it was hard to accept that it had happened at all, and apparently it had all been for naught as Jason was still to be punished for not following Black Mask’s directions to the letter. “Don’t touch him!”

“Terrance, do me a favor and help our guest to properly view the show,” Black Mask commanded.

One of the men scoffed, seemingly disappointed with his new job, and released Jason only to pick Dick up by his hair and force him to sit on his knees in spite of the injuries. “Shut up and watch or it’ll get worse for him. Boss doesn’t like when his punishments are interrupted.”

Dick groaned from discomfort and frustration. Why had Jason shot him? It hadn’t helped their situation, and if he wasn’t injured, the two of them could have handled these men easily. But now he was thoroughly incapacitated, and Jason was going to be raped. Again. Right in front of him.

But why? Jason was still on his feet. His bullet wound must have hurt, but Jason had always had a higher pain tolerance. Why was he letting this happen?

“Jay…Run. Just Run. Please. You can get away. Don’t worry about me,” Dick begged. Without Jason, Black Mask was sure to make Dick suffer more, but after all Jason had been through, he owed him that much.

Jason’s head dropped, and the men finished stripping away his boxers, leaving him completely exposed as Black Mask laughed.

Black Mask walked around Jason running his gloved hand along Jason’s shoulders, chest, neck, and face, showing his total possession. “You don’t get it, Nightwing. X came back to me because you ruined that which is most perfect about him: his eyes. He needed my Virus to fix the damage, and I only give it to him if he allows me to…test his limits.” He stopped pacing and slapped Jason hard enough that his cheek swelled with a fresh bruise and he spat out a tooth. But Jason didn’t look shocked, only numb. “He’ll take whatever I feel like giving him as long as he gets his precious Virus when it’s over. And the Virus makes everything better. Isn’t that right, X?”

“Y…Yes, Sir…” Jason couldn’t look at Dick. His body continued to shake slightly from fear and anticipation of what was coming.

“Now he’s going to face punishment because he pissed me off. It’s as simple as that. But he won’t leave because that hole in his leg won’t be fixed if I don’t give him his dose of the Virus. That way he can be perfect again and continue to be of use to me.” Black Mask grabbed Jason by his hair and forced his head back. “The moment he proves that he’s not worth my time, I’ll have him begging for the mercy of death. Isn’t that right, X?”

Jason swallowed hard, but apparently took too long to reply.

“Hogarth, show him what happens when he hesitates.”

The biggest of the men took firm hold of Jason’s right arm and snapped it out of place with ease. Jason let out a cry of pain and Black Mask took the opportunity to affix a spider gag into his mouth; the hard metal wires forcing it open. Hogarth then forced Jason onto his knees.

“Stop. Please!” Dick begged, struggling against Terrance’s hold on him. “Don’t do this!”

Black Mask crossed his arms. “Boys, in two hours Batman will see everything that our X sees. Why not give him a show?”

Terrance snickered before slicing the back of Dick’s shirt open and stripping it off of him. He protested and tried to fight but the man was much larger than him and he wasn’t able to use his legs as they were. While he tried to break free, Jason was pushed forward. He caught himself with his left arm and Hogarth forced him to raise his hips up.

“Stop! Don’t!” Dick clawed at Terrance’s face, ripping skin where he could in a pitiful attempt to get free. “Jay! Jay you have to fight it!”

“We’ve been ordered to give your Bat-Daddy a show, Pretty-Bird,” Terrance jeered. “How about you make this a little easier for us?”

“Fuck you!”

“Well, if that’s how you wanna play…” Terrance wrapped his calloused hand around Dick’s neck and, in one swift motion, slammed him down so that his head bounced off the floor. The impact had Dick seeing spots. For a long moment, it left the world muted. Trapped in his own mind, Dick spiraled into a dark place.

A concussion was bad. It left him vulnerable. He could be moved wrong and his head could respond badly. He could pass out and never wake up. Would he be missed? Would Bruce be upset? Would Jason even care?

Water dripped onto Dick’s face and he truly believed that he was floating. Like a corpse he and Bruce had once found out at Gotham Bay, floating towards the pier on a rainy evening. The corpse had been so fresh. Just a child. Likely an immigrant looking for safe harbor through less than safe means. Though it was sad, it was beautiful. Dick had wanted to lift the corpse out of the water and cradle it against himself. Warm it up and bring it back. Could he be brought back?

Another drop of water hit his face, this time just below his eye.

The sound of splashing worried Dick. Was the corpse not really a corpse? Had he left the floating child for dead? He had to swim. Had to focus. Had to save the boy.

“Ahh ahh ahh.”

More drops struck Dick’s face and he finally registered that the wet sound wasn’t thrashing on water, but skin on skin contact; slapping in the lewdest sense. The voice…the moans, they were close by. They weren’t pleasured sounds. They attested to someone in pain. Someone who couldn’t speak.

Dick’s mind continued to try to piece itself together. He was with X…no, Jason…Jason was…still under Black Mask’s control. No, he was there by his own will? That didn’t feel right either.

“Auuugh!”

Vision returned to Dick as he recognized the voice. Jason was in pain. Jason needed help. Jason…

…was right over him.

The spider gag was a humiliating tool. Not only did it prevent its wearer from human speech, but it didn’t allow them much opportunity to swallow their own spit. It was crude and used most often so that the wearer’s mouth would be slick enough to take a cock. Dick wasn’t unfamiliar with it; he’d rescued quite a few women as Nightwing and all of the women who had been wearing that sort of gag looked particularly haggard when he reached them.

Jason was still bent over, barely able to keep his face from dropping down onto Dick’s, and Hogarth was taking him from behind, holding onto his dislocated arm to force him to stay upright just enough so that he was leaning right over Dick’s face.

“N-no…” Dick’s head was still swimming. His legs seemed to be screaming at him in pain, though he couldn’t remember why. He could finally see Jason clearly. The young man’s face was streaked with tears; his eyes half lidded at all times. The tears and spit were dripping down onto Dick’s face as his body jerked at a cruel rhythm. “Jay…Jay…”

“That’s right you fuckin’ toilet! Take it!” Hogarth shouted, his pace quickening. “Fuckin’ love getting to stretch you out all over again!” He moved even faster before burying his full length inside of Jason as he reached his climax. Jason moaned and whimpered, a pool of saliva spilling over Dick’s face as Hogarth finished inside of him.

But it wasn’t going to end there. Hogarth withdrew and dick’s eyes rolled upward to find, to his horror, blood and a thick liquid streaking Jason’s inner thighs.

“Show’s not over, but let’s make it more interesting,” Black Mask said in a disturbingly low growl. “Our little soldier has yet to satisfy Terrance and Gregory. But I’ll tell you what, Nightwing, you get to decide his fate. If you don’t want it, he won’t have to take another man’s cock up that wrecked ass of his.”

“No!” Dick said quickly. "No, please, don’t. No more.”

Jason closed his eyes and shook his head, his chest shuddering with sobs that Dick mistakenly believed to be grateful.

“You heard the boy,” Black Mask said in a sneer. “Terrance, I didn’t say anything about X’s face.”

“Yes sir.” Terrance knelt down on Dick’s chest with all his weight. Dick gasped as he felt his own ribs crack under the pressure. Terrance proceeded to unzip his slacks and draw out his half erect manhood right before Dicks eyes. He raked his hand through Jason’s hair, forcing his head to arch back painfully before forcing his full length right into Jason’s mouth. Dick tried to beg, but Terrance’s knee pressed painfully against him.

Hogarth released Jason’s dislocated arm and it fell limply next to Dick’s head. Jason was now being held up by Terrance. Hogarth stepped aside, still rubbing himself back to full-mast as Gregory took his place behind Jason. Dick wanted to scream. Wanted to let his protests be known, but Terrance pressed harder and he barely even let out a cry of pain as his ribs gave out more under the pressure.

“X is already pretty opened up thanks to Hogarth,” Gregory commented. “Guess we can start with three then.”

To Dick’s horror, Gregory slid three un-lubricated fingers into Jason’s hole. The sudden penetration made Jason sputter around Terrance’s cock, which only seemed to egg the man on. While Jason was cruelly fingered by Gregory, Terrance placed a hand around his neck to feel himself fuck straight into Jason’s throat.

“There, that’s sucking me in pretty well. Did I find your sweet spot, X? Guess it’s time to add another finger then.”

Dick reached up, hopeful that he might be able to pry Terrance away, but only earning more weight on his chest. He scrambled to get his hands around Terrance’s knee in a futile attempt to relieve some of the weight.

Terrance moaned loudly, indicating his climax. He held himself all the way inside of Jason for too long, making Jason shake and his face turn somewhat purple as he wasn’t allowed a breath. When he finally pulled out, saliva and the man’s sperm spilled down over Dick’s face thickly as Jason coughed and sputtered, trying desperately to catch his breath. He whimpered and moaned as Gregory continued to work his four fingers into him, milking his prostate.

Terrance sheathed himself back in his pants and straightened up, proceeding to stomp down on Dick’s sternum. Dick yelped and gasped as one of his ribs threatened to puncture his lung. He struggled under Terrance’s foot, all the while with Jason looking at him in agony.

“We’re not done yet, X.”

“Auuugh! AAAAAUUUUGH!”

Jason writhed in place as Gregory curled his fingers inside of him and began to mercilessly fist fuck him, punching into his prostate over and over again. Jason screamed. His whole body protesting the too-large intrusion. But the abuse of his prostate forced his own member to stiffen until he came just above Dick’s head.

Gregory continued to punch into him for a few minutes after the fact before slowly pulling out—the horrible sound of his whole hand slipping past Jason’s abused hole—and wiping the mess on his hand on Jason’s back. “That’s a good boy,” he cooed before pushing Jason, making him collapse to the side.

Terrance finally stepped off of Dick and he curled in on himself and turned so that he was face to face with Jason. He carefully removed the gag and shakily stroked Jason’s cheek. “I’m…sorry,” he breathed. He didn’t care about the mess. He didn’t care about anything. All that mattered was Jason, and Jason was violated, humiliated, and hurt. “I’m so…sorry.”

Jason, his eyes still fresh with tears, stared at Dick blankly and whispered, “I…hate…you…”

“Time to move them. Knock him out.”

One hard kick to the head and everything went dark.


	13. Keep It Even

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Black Mask continues to punish X and Dick. They are given the opportunity to choose which of them takes what punishments.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeeeaaaahhhh not sure what to say beyond this:
> 
> Fair warning: the torment doesn't end with this chapter...

X continued to stare at Dick’s unconscious form numbly. This man—this pathetic excuse for a man—had brought him to this lowly state. It was his fault. Why had X missed that shot? If he’d only done what he was so good at…If only he’d shot Dick Grayson between the eyes. If he’d just done that when first given the opportunity, none of this would have happened. He’d have never been “rescued” by the Batman. He’d have never been welcomed into Bruce Wayne’s home. He’d have never felt the kindness that some people were capable of offering.

He’d have never failed Roman.

“We have about one hour before Batman catches on to what’s been happening to these two. You know where to take them. Bring the proper equipment. And for an added measure, blindfold X. They don’t need to see where they’ll be going.

X didn’t even bother to resist as Terrance secured the blindfold and hoisted him up over his shoulder. His stomach, ass, throat…everything still ached…but he knew the punishment was far from over. Roman was upset, and he wouldn’t stop until he was satisfied.

X accepted that the blindfold wasn’t for his own sake. He knew exactly where he was when it was removed. There was a hidden hall in the bowels of the Janus building where Roman Sionis was able to hide his more personal agendas. The room that X and Dick had been taken to was completely concrete. Aside from a single circulating fan, there was no airflow. The room felt too bright due to the high-powered fluorescent lights that circled the edges of the ceiling. A table was set up by the wall furthest from the door and X knew that it was littered with the tools and toys with which Roman would proceed with their punishment. In the middle of the room, hanging from the ceiling over a two-feet-tall wooden stool, was a long leather strap that resembled a leash.

“Surely you remember this room fondly,” Roman teased as he went over to the table. “Such long sessions spent here, testing the limits of the human body.”

X shuddered. The guards had let him go and standing on his own proved immensely difficult. The bullet wound in his leg oozed blood every time he put a little too much weight on it, and his ass was painfully sore from being penetrated so unceremoniously. Still he knew that any sign of resistance, any word of protest, would be met with further punishment. So, he stayed on his feet and awaited further punishment.

“Hogarth, the collars.”

The largest of the guards retrieved a pair of black leather collars from the table and handed one off to Gregory.

“For X, secure it to the sixth notch. That should teach him a lesson.”

X cringed, knowing full well that the collar made it difficult to breathe at four notches. Hogarth fastened it on him, mercilessly forcing it to that sixth notch before securing it. Already X was left laboriously sucking in air.

“Nightwing seems so delicate. Let’s just leave him at three notches.”

Gregory nodded and proceeded to secure the collar loosely around Dick’s neck. X found himself resenting Dick even more for the leniency that Roman had inexplicably been showing him. X had been raped. Dick had been injured. X wouldn’t be able to breathe. Dick would barely have to try. It wasn’t fair. It was just another reminder of how X was nothing to the world while Dick would be missed. Dick would be rescued if Batman could figure things out. Dick would always be rescued.

-Why didn’t he save me?-

Why had that thought crossed X’s mind? It was unwelcome and senseless. Batman had no obligation to him. He’d much preferred if Batman had never taken notice of him in the first place. Then he could be at the bar now, reading something uplifting. Perhaps something without any underlying message to be gleamed. Kafka sounded nice. Something dark with no reason. Something that he could sink into without promise of satisfactory ending. That sounded pleasant.

“Come here, X.”

X snapped out of his daydream to obey Roman’s command. He stood just next to the stool and waited.

“Terrance, you know my favorite knots. Bind Nightwing’s arms behind his back. Those pathetic legs of his are still useless as they are.”

Terrance nodded and retrieved a red rope which he proceeded to tie Dick up with. Roman already had a rope handy for X and dealt with him personally. X’s dislocated arm proved somewhat difficult to work with, but Roman still managed to bind X’s arms securely so that his hands were on opposite elbows and his wrists pulled upward painfully. The ropes wrapped around X’s chest, cutting slightly into his skin. X knew the knots well. They truly were Roman’s favorites; if loosened at one point they tightened at another. With Jason’s useless arm creating extra weight, the ropes were unbearably tight against his chest.

It wasn’t long before Terrance was done and Dick was similarly bound. While Terrance forced Dick onto his knees, fastening one end of the hanging leash to his collar, Roman looked X in the eyes and explained, “We’re about to play a game, boy. But before we get your pretty little friend involved, there’s an extra rule I want you to keep in mind. You, my precious little assassin, are invaluable to me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy watching you suffer. I’ll continue to push you to the limits of the human body and heal you again and again, as many times as it takes. Your little friend there, is invaluable to me too in the way that he can be used as leverage, but his life is less important to me. That being said, if he were to die before I am able to properly use him as leverage against Batman, I will be very put out.”

X swallowed with great difficulty and nodded.

“However, I will not heal him until our session is over. If he dies before the end of the session, you will be healed only so that it can all start over from the beginning, only the second time around you’ll receive every bit of punishment that had been dealt to him as well, and I’ll keep repeating the process for an entire month. Do I make myself clear?”

X nodded again. “C…crystal…”

Roman smiled. “Perfect. Time to wake up sleeping beauty then.” He grabbed the dangling end of the leash and gave it a hard tug before connecting it to the metal loop in Jason's collar.

X x X x X

Dick awoke with a start to the frightening sensation of strangulation. He tried to reach for whatever had him by the neck, but the more he tried to move his arms the tighter his chest felt, sending him into a full-on panic. Why couldn’t he stand? Why couldn’t he move? Why couldn’t he breathe?

His body instinctively pulled against the force tugging at his neck. He leaned forward in spite of the pain and tried to maintain control of whatever was trying to hurt him. He had to win this tug-of-war in order to breathe.

“D…ick…Gkh…”

That voice, though. Dick opened his eyes and followed the sound to find Jason at his side, his whole body thrashing as he was being hanged over a short stool. Dick’s eyes followed the black leather noose around Jason’s neck to the anchor point in the ceiling, where it looped around and connected to…

Oh.

Dick did his best to sit up straight—a painful feat with him sitting on his shot-out knees—and felt the tension around his neck ease. He glanced over slightly to find that Jason was now standing on his tip-toes on the stool, struggling to maintain his balance with his own bullet wound to worry about. It was much easier for Dick to breathe that way, but it was clear that it was still a considerable struggle for Jason.

“Welcome back, Nightwing. Or do you prefer to be called Dick?”

Dick gave Black Mask the best glare that he could muster given the circumstances, which felt pretty pathetic.

“We’re going to play a game, Pretty-Bird. You and X will take turns, so it’ll be completely fair.”

Something in the pit of Dick’s stomach knew that fairness was far from Black Mask’s mind.

“I’ll describe to you exactly what I’m going to do to you, and you’ll have the option to accept the punishment, or pass it on to one another. It’s as simple as that.”

Dick shuddered. “You’re sick.”

“Am I really any sicker than a grown man in a bat costume abducting orphans and letting them fight his battles for him?” Black Mask traced his gloved hand along Jason’s exposed chest and plucked at the ropes. Dick understood that he was similarly bound and willed himself to stop struggling against them. “I’ll tell you what, Pretty-Bird, if you last out for the next three hours, I’ll give X his dose of Techno-Virus and his punishment will be over.”

“What about me?”

“You’ll have survived. Your reward will be a dose for yourself, after your operation is complete.”

Dick knew exactly what sort of operation Black Mask meant. “You’ll make me into another slave then?”

“Only if you survive that long. Terrance?”

One of the men held a digital camera and began filming them.

“We’ve got to make sure that the Bat gets you from every angle,” Black Mask explained. “To get things started, we’ll let you go first.” He fetched a scalpel from the table. “I’m going to carve the words ‘Batman’s bitch’ across your chest. Are you good with that?”

Dick’s eyes flicked towards Jason, who was still fighting every moment just to breathe.

“I…I’ll take it,” Dick decided. At least, in some small way, he could ease Jason’s pain.

At least this time…

“It’ll be fun to markup that beautiful body of yours, Pretty-Bird. I’m sure I’m not the only man in Gotham to have wanted just that,” Black Mask said as he knelt in front of Dick. “Make sure to get a good shot of this, Terrance. I want Bruce Wayne to see my handiwork.”

Dick did his best to brace for the pain, but Black Mask made sure to be a rough as possible. Uneven cuts, varying depths, and slowly carved letters felt like his skin was being torn right from his chest. His arms involuntarily tensed as they tried to move to stop the torture, but that only tightened the ropes around his chest near the fresh cuts, making them that much worse. It was hardly any consolation to know that, after the Virus, there wouldn’t even be a scar to remember this by.

Black Mask finished the last letter and got to his feet. Dick shuddered from the pain, but it was finally over. He could handle the dull sensation of staunch air against his open wounds. He felt worse knowing that it had been filmed and Bruce would have to see the horrible message that had been placed upon his person.

Black Mask returned to the table to select his next means of torment. He picked up a blowtorch and a metal rod with an X at the end. It took Dick a moment to recognize that it was a brand. His breathing quickened at the thought of being burned by it. He’d never been branded, but the descriptions of the process weren’t lost on him. And having dealt with some nasty burns over the years, he couldn’t imagine having something that hot pressed against his skin for any extended period of time.

“Now then. I think you’d look stunning with a little X tramp stamp, don’t you?” Black Mask began heating up the end of the brand with a sick smile on his face. “What do you say, son?”

X didn’t even hesitate. “Pass.”

Not that Dick could blame him. He knew that Jason had been put through a lot in the time that he’d spent as X. Maybe his body didn’t have scars, but he was no stranger to pain. Dick could handle this. He had to.

But as the sound of that torch drew closer to him, his body shook. “So sorry, Pretty-Bird. After our session where I covered him with so many brands that he looked like he was covered in scales, I thought for sure X would take that one.”

The trembling stopped as Dick could all but hear the screams from this previous session. “You sick bast—”

Dick bit his tongue by accident when the brand pressed into the small of his back at the base of his spine. He swallowed his own screams as his body jerked. His skin boiled and melted under the heat of the brand. The moment Mask pulled the brand away Dick’s body fell limp, sagging against the leash. A soft gasp reminded him who was on the other end, but his body continued to recoil from the pain regardless. It was when the pressure against his neck became particularly bad that he finally managed to straighten himself up again, only to feel his stomach knot when Jason’s feet didn’t seem to support him on the stool.

“Jay…” Dick spat out a mouthful of blood from the spot where he’d bitten right through his tongue and whimpered. “Jay, please.”

“Wake him up, Hogarth,” Black Mask demanded.

One swift punch to the gut and Jason was gasping again. His feet straightened to points, but he trembled violently. Dick almost wished he hadn’t said anything. This seemed far crueler than passing out from oxygen deprivation.

“And with that we circle back around to you, Pretty-Bird.” Mask tossed the brand aside and returned the torch to the table. “I’ve got something particularly amusing in mind. After all, Nightwing’s known for having quite the mouth on him. So, I propose that we sew it shut.” He held up a large curved needle and fishing line. “What do you say? Of course, if you don’t want it, I’m sure X wouldn’t mind. Not a meaningful sentence has ever come out of that mouth. Though it would be a shame to seal it up again. Not that a few stitches would stop Terrance from getting his rocks off.”

Dick bit his lip, his shoulders betraying the sobs that were bubbling up in him. “I…I’ll take it…” He stole another sidelong glance at Jason, whose expression showed no hint of sympathy.

“Well, if you insist.” Mask crouched before Dick once again and took his time with his work.

The pain wasn’t beyond Dick’s ability to handle, but it was still considerable. Each time the needle pressed into the soft flesh around his lips he had to close his eyes and force himself to breathe through his nose. The taste of blood was still fresh in his mouth from earlier.

“This one is one of my favorites,” Mask whispered to make sure that Jason couldn’t hear him. “The things I’ve sealed inside that pretty mouth of his. Once he even swallowed one of the burning coals I left in his mouth. Can you imagine how that must have felt, sliding down his esophagus? Every agonizing inch as it worked its way into his stomach.”

A stray tear spilled over from Dick’s eye at the mental image. They’d lost Jason so long ago. Had he truly been put through such living hell that whole time? How could they call themselves heroes when he’d been through all that without them even being aware?

Mask tied off the final stitch and Dick continued to sob through his nose.

“I think a close up of his Golden Boy is in order, Terrance.” The camera was pushed right up to Dick’s face as the guards chuckled to themselves. “And, where were we? Ahh yes, I’ve got just the thing.” He retrieved a pair of small bolt cutters and walked around Jason like a shark circling his prey. “I’m going to slice off three of your fingers. Keep in mind, boy, that Nightwing’s death will spell continued punishment for the rest of the month for you. He probably can’t take much more shock. So…what do you say?”

Dick flinched. A month of this? That was the deal if…if he died? “Mmm!”

“I’ll…take it…”

“Mmm mmmm! Mmmmmmmm!”

“That’s a good boy. Let’s give the Bat a show, shall we?” He stepped behind Jason and forced him to uncurl his fists. “You’d better hope the Virus regrows appendages, X. I don’t know that I’ll have much use for you if you’re missing one of your trigger fingers.” One strong slice and Jason’s body all but convulsed. Dick couldn’t bear to watch. He kept his eyes tightly shut and felt the slight jerks from the leash. Dick had basically hanged Jason when he’d been hurt. Jason, on the other hand, didn’t utter a sound and barely pulled against the leash. It was awful.

When it was over, Dick opened his eyes and whimpered upon seeing the castaway fingers lying on the floor in front of him. He ventured to glance up at Jason and was shocked to see green eyes all but glowing as they stared intently ahead.

Jason Todd was born with blue eyes and black hair. After returning from the grave a streak of white adorned his ebony hair and flecks of green littered his irises. Jason usually did a good job of dyeing his hair (at least after officially taking on the moniker of Red Hood) and his eyes maintained their blue-green luster except for when he was injured. It was something that Dick had only witnessed in passing one night upon accidentally assisting his brother on patrol. Jason had been shot in the arm and Dick kept insisting on getting him back to the Manor so that Alfred could stitch him up. Jason just scoffed at the offer and said that his body had a knack for quick recovery ever since his dip in the Lazarus Pit. As proof, he flashed Dick a dazzling smile that was eerily enhanced by his almost glowing green eyes. Upon running into Jason again a couple nights later, there was nothing but a minor scar where the bullet wound had been.

How could Dick have not realized it sooner?

If Janus Cosmetics was producing a virus that acted as a cure-all, it would be in Roman’s best interest to sell it or at least make it known so that it could be used to his benefit. It was one thing if Jason was the first step in human trials, but Jason had been there for about a year now and the Virus wasn’t even public knowledge.

It’s because Jason was the perfect test subject. The Pit in his blood mixed with a drug that accelerated healing acted as a dual agent. One sped up the other, allowing Jason’s body to recover at super-human speed.

Dick’s body, however, didn’t offer such an enhancement.

“Mmm…” He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t tell Jason what he’d realized. Would it even matter? X didn’t want to face any unnecessary punishment. As long as keeping Dick alive meant avoiding a longer punishment, X would do whatever it took…right?

Could Dick really live with that?

“Well, clearly we have to modify the rules now that you’ve been silenced,” Black Mask noted, looking down at Dick. “Blink once for acceptance. Blink twice to pass. And we’ll make this easy.” He picked up a mallet and stung it around threateningly. “I’m going to crush your feet,” he announced. “Both of them.”

This was too much, especially with the knowledge that Dick had now. He wouldn’t recover from this abuse, at least not like Jason would. But Jason would be kept alive while he wouldn’t. Jason would be tortured longer if he died. And if Jason’s feet were destroyed, there’s no way he’d be able to stay on the stool.

There was no real choice here. As Dick had feared, this game was rigged. Not that Dick would want Jason to suffer…

…but his feet?

Dick was an acrobat. He was light on his feet. It was his natural talent. What his family had passed on to him. His legacy wasn’t without a stain or two, but his own parents were as pure as things got and they’d passed onto him their masterful acrobatics. Broken feet would mean the end of that. The end of Nightwing.

But it was broken feet or death.

There was nothing noble to be gleamed from this decision. He blinked once and continued to sob.

“Mm…sorry…”

Dick froze. His heart skipped a beat. He looked up at Jason, whose brilliant green eyes were trained on Dick now. “I’m…sorry…” he managed to rasp out.

For the first time through all of this, he showed signs of sympathy. He seemed to recognize that Dick was going to suffer, and it made him reluctant. Apologetic.

Dick took what comfort he could from that. In fact, he focused on Jason’s slow, labored breaths. Closed his eyes and listened only to that sound. It was proof that, throughout all of this, Jason was still alive. Even if he wasn’t himself, he was alive. Painful as that could sometimes be for him, it was an improvement that Dick cherished. He loved his brother. Even if they had never been close upon his return, having him back was enough.

Jason was alive.

Jason Todd was still alive.

That young boy who had taken up the Robin mantle, the fearless street-rat who fought tooth and nail to prove that he wasn’t just Dick’s replacement, but every bit as worthy of working with Batman as anyone could be…

…he was still alive and breathing.

SMACK!


	14. Familiar Pain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Black Mask's torture session reaches its climax as he brings back something that X finally remembers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poooooooor Dick.
> 
> "Don't worry! The Techno-Organic Virus will fix him!"
> 
> ...immediately after he came to the realization that Jason's unusual physiology is what allows the Virus to work the way that it does on him...
> 
> ...Oops...

X couldn’t say why, but when Roman announced the punishment of crushing Dick’s feet, something inside of him felt sickened by the thought. It was senseless. Grayson was the cause of so much of his pain, and yet the idea of his feet being crushed was…unbearable. It was too much. X tried to scrape at the part of his mind that felt that; see if there was anything else that could tell him, but he just couldn’t reach it. Maybe he was just delirious. Oxygen deprivation could do that to a man.

Still, he felt obligated to show Dick some form of comfort.

“Mm…sorry…”

It didn’t sound right. He licked his chapped lips with his too dry tongue and tried again.

“I’m…sorry…” It was quiet and broken, but the words felt right. If it was all that he could give, that would be okay.

SMACK!

“MMMMMHHH!”

X closed his eyes. The awful sound of the mallet’s impact made him feel nauseous. There were hundreds of individual bones in the human foot, and X had just heard many of them break and separate.

SMACK!

“MMMMAAAAAAAAAAGH!”

That had been even worse. The muffled sound of fishing line ripping through skin, popping out as Dick’s mouth peeled open. The screaming continued, and it was all X could do to stagnate his breathing to allow Dick some leeway upon straining against the leash.

The leash was constantly taut, and X’s collar was too tight anyways, so he wound up more concerned with bracing himself. It was when Dick pulled hard enough for X to lose his footing that the real danger kicked in. But after this, how could he blame Dick for dying? Death would be a mercy. He considered stepping off of the stool himself to cut off Dick’s air. It wouldn’t be quick, but compared to what Roman still had in store, it would be nothing.

“You two have held up surprisingly well. It’s been long enough that Batman should have discovered the time difference by now. He’s likely witnessing all of this as it happens, right alongside the footage that’s being instantly uploaded from the camera.” X didn’t like the thought of the people back at the Bat-Cave witnessing this. He wanted some sort of privacy in spite of it all. The only real mercy he’d been granted was that his own rape had been filmed only with his own eyes. If the other camera had been involved then, it would have been…humiliating…

“Well let’s keep this show exciting then!” Roman dropped the mallet next to Dick and the once brave hero flinched and cried like a frightened child. How could he be the same man who had brought X to this state? It didn’t feel right. “Ahh, this looks like a good one.” The sound of metal scraping along the table demanded attention, but X was still focused on the shaky mass that was Nightwing. “X, I’m going to break your ribs and probably puncture a lung with this.”

X finally looked to Roman, but his eyes fell on the crowbar.

“We’ll say…ten swings? Five front-hand, five back-hand.”

Tell me which hurts more; front-hand…or back-hand…?

“Heh…”

The memory overcame him like a powerful wave, threatening to pull him into the depths. The feeling of that crowbar. The sound of that voice. The all-consuming silence that followed the most deafening explosion he’d ever heard.

And the pain in his chest from the knowledge that he’d failed…he’d failed…who had he failed.

“I’m sure it’ll be even more difficult to breathe with a punctured lung. Might be dangerous to take this one on yourself, son. But don’t let me influence your decision. I’m sure Nightwing won’t take it any easier than you. Batman only trained you both so well, after all.”

“Haha…”

Tell the big man I said…hello…

“So, what’ll it be?”

“I’ve…got this one you…you fuckin’ freak.”

No more showing weakness. No more cowering. Jason knew everything. He knew who he was. He knew what had happened to him. He knew what had been done for him.

He knew that he had to protect Dick.

Roman, however, didn’t seem to appreciate the different tone that accompanied his answer. “Very well then.”

Dick tried to shout out some incoherent protests, but they fell on deaf ears as Roman slammed the curved part of the crowbar into Jason’s ribcage, effectively knocking what little air he had right out of him. Still, with each passing hit, Jason felt his own lips curling into a smile.

This wasn’t so bad. The Joker hadn’t been kind enough to hit him with the curve. No, that clown-bastard had all but hooked the end under his ribs and pried them outward with every strike.

When Roman was done, Jason carefully found his balance on the stool and spat a mouthful of blood right at his captor’s eye, earning himself an extra hit.

“Well, now I’m in a foul mood. Let’s liven things up while we can. Now, that you’ve regained the use of your mouth, Pretty-Bird, how about we put it to good use?” Roman kept the crowbar in one hand but knelt to retrieve one of Jason’s recently severed fingers. “I’m going to feed you this. Simple as that. Now that you can speak, do you accept?”

Dick shuddered, and Jason worried that, given how things had been going, the idiot would accept. So, he dropped to his heels on the stool, cutting off his own airflow and pulling Dick up enough to make him panic. After just a moment he pushed back onto his toes and nearly threw up from the sheer intensity of the pain that his entire body was experiencing.

But he couldn’t stop.

“I…can…take it,” he managed to rasp out. He hoped that Dick got the message, because he’d just wind up choking the guy again if he tried to accept the punishment.

Dick’s glassy blue eyes were wrecked. Poor guy looked miserable, and Jason couldn’t really blame him. If he felt half as bad as Jason did…

“P…pass…” Dick muttered, to Roman’s chagrin.

“Really? Well, I guess it can’t be helped.” Roman stood up and brushed Jason’s own index finger over his lips. “Cannibalism seemed like fun, but I can’t say I anticipated auto-cannibalism.”

“M…meat is meat,” Jason said, letting a weak smile play onto his face. “But it’s…good to know you…draw the line somewhere…”

Roman growled and shoved the severed finger into Jason’s mouth, holding his hand over it. “You’re starting to piss me off, boy.”

Jason thought of at least a hundred good comebacks, but with Roman’s gloved hand still covering his mouth, there wasn’t really much that he could say.

Roman proceeded to plug Jason’s nose and wait. With how little oxygen he’d been getting before that, Jason had no choice but to swallow his own appendage. The sensation was sickening. The thought was worse. And what was to stop Roman from going further? From cutting him into little pieces to feed to himself?

No. Jason was going to stop him. It was just going to suck.

Roman released Jason and he gulped in air as much as his collar allowed, but was quick to settle his breathing, Ducra’s lessons on meditation coming to mind.

“Well that didn’t seem all that cinematic. I think it’s about time that we made things more interesting. What do you say, X? Time to gouge out an eye?”

No time for hesitation. Roman was still close, and that would have to be enough.

Jason kicked the man in the stomach with what little strength he could muster. Gregory was quick to try and tackle him in retaliation. Jason managed to get his uninjured leg up over the mountain of a man’s shoulder and squeezed his head between his thighs, giving him a higher perch and affording himself and Dick enough slack to make breathing a little easier.

Bruce wouldn’t approve, but there was no room for mercy here.

With one careful motion, Jason twisted his hips and Gregory’s neck with it. The large man’s body went into shock before collapsing, at which point Jason used it as quick leverage to propel his feet upward. He caught both his side and Dick’s side of the leash in his mouth and kicked hard against the ceiling. Though he nearly ripped out a few teeth in the process, he was able to pull the anchor point right out of the ceiling.

Of course, what came next wasn’t going to be fun either. Gregory’s corpse only cushioned Jason’s falling impact so much and his whole body screamed and threatened to quit on him. Dick, still a mess on the floor, hadn’t seemed to fully register Jason’s attack yet, not that he could be much help as he was, but he was still very much in danger. Jason rolled off of Gregory and dropped to the floor quickly to trip Hogarth as he lunged at him. The large man skid across the floor and it was all Jason could do to drop his body weight on the man’s head. He wasn’t completely certain that he’d killed the guy, but he’d at least managed to knock him out.

“Time to move, Dickie-Bird!” he shouted, feeling a little more confident now that he was breathing a little easier. They were still connected, and his collar was still too tight, but he’d just have to work that out along the way.

Dick, however, collapsed to the floor in a tearful heap and Jason felt his blood run cold. He couldn’t handle Black Mask. Some too-big guards with little fighting training? Sure. Black Mask? Maybe if he wasn’t beaten to shit and bound. As he was, he was screwed.

“Heads up!”

Jason didn’t really think, he just ducked. A birdarang sliced the ropes around his wrists and the painful bondage suddenly fell off of him.

This was just the improvement that he needed.

“Wing’s in trouble!” he shouted, not completely sure where their rescuers were. His dislocated arm still hung limply at his side, but he’d fix that when he was able. First, he had to deal with Terrance.

This particular grunt had left a nasty taste in Jason’s mouth, and for that, he wasn’t going to get any mercy. Still, naked, with one usable arm, one functional leg, and a collar that still made breathing difficult, he only had so many options to work with.

“You’re fuckin’ screwed, X! I’ll break that other arm of yours and your legs as well! We’ll hang you up and use you like a fuckin’ swing! You hear me?”

Jason’s skin crawled as unwanted recent memories surfaced. He knew that the threats weren’t unfounded, and that only pissed him off more.

“Just try and touch me, you piece of shit!”

Terrance threw the camera, forcing Jason to move out of the way and right into the zone where he had planned to attack. A strong hand wrapped around Jason’s dislocated arm’s bicep and he used the opportunity to headbutt Terrance with all the strength that he still had. It stunned the big guy and three birdarangs nailed the guy in one eye, and both hands.

Roman seemed more keen on watching things unfold, so Jason continued to do what he could.

“I need a quick fix for my arm!” he shouted.

Damian dropped from the ceiling where he’d apparently been lifting the panel to throw his signature weapons, and he took hold of Jason’s useless arm. “This is going to hurt, Todd.”

“I’d be disappointed if it didn’t,” he said as smugly as he could. Damian pulled, and he pulled away. He let out a quick shout that was cut off by his collar. Satisfied with his work on Jason’s arm, Damian used the blade of one of his birdarangs to slice the collar off of Jason’s neck. “Thanks, twerp.”

“So, you’re back then. About time.”

“Wish I hadn’t wasted so much time,” Jason confessed. “Help Dick. I’ll deal with the others.”

“No. Father wouldn’t want you to—” Jason picked up the crowbar Roman had cast aside and went to town on Hogarth’s head, bashing his skull in without any hint of mercy.

Bruce came bursting through the main door with Tim on his heels and neither paid the scene much mind. Tim slid over to Dick, a familiar bottle of silvery solution in hand. Jason let out a sigh of relief, happy to know that Dick would be okay.

“Agent X, kill code…”

Jason’s body stiffened. He looked over his shoulder at Roman and realized his mistake. He should have taken out the true monster first. He let his anger towards the men who’d raped him overwhelm him.

“Wait…”

“…arsenic.”


	15. Too Little Too Late

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce, Tim, and Damian stage their rescue. Despite their best efforts, it just isn't enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyo! Light at the end of the tunnel? Not really! Sorry not sorry!
> 
> Anywho, I realized while editing that this is basically a recap of the previous chapter from the rest of the boys' perspectives. Not a whole lot of new information in this one. Oops.
> 
> But to make up for it, I'll continue to plow onward, putting up the next chapters as quickly as possible!

Tim felt his heart actually stop when Jason’s visual feed showed the phone messages he’d sent to Dick. Bruce, who had nearly settled on a plan of attack, all but slammed a hand on the Bat-Computer’s mainframe.

“Tim—”

“I…I’m trying…I didn’t know…”

The feed continued, showing Jason upon full recovery, suiting up, stashing a gun, and going out. He didn’t go far; settling against a brick wall on the side of the Janus Cosmetics building, where Dick soon pulled up on his bike.

“Tim!” Bruce shouted.

“I’m trying! Oh god oh god oh god!” Tim had never worked faster. In no time he had a second feed up. This feed showed a concrete room and little else. Jason was somewhere, intently staring at the wall. The sounds, though, were concerning.

A file popped up and Tim swallowed hard. “It’s from Janus. It…it says BETTERANGLE.”

“Open it!”

Tim opened the file and pulled up the live video feed. Alfred was quick to turn away and cover his ears. Damian swore loudly, and Bruce’s eyes narrowed. Black Mask was carving the words “Batman’s bitch” across Dick’s exposed chest.

“Find their location NOW!”

Tim was shaking with worry and anger over what was being done to his brothers. “They’re still in Janus Cosmetics, but I…I can’t pinpoint the exact location. I need to go there and—”

“Stay here. Both of you.” Bruce hopped into the Batmobile and sped off before anyone could protest.

“Like hell I’m staying here!” Damian exclaimed. “He’s blinded by his feelings. I have to stay level-headed. Drake, upload all three feeds to my communicator and send me full schematics of the building.”

“There’s only the public schematics,” Tim confirmed, having already started what Damian had demanded. “But the air vents indicate that there are lower floors. Bruce will likely be heading straight to Roman’s main office, but I don’t think that’s where they are. Maybe he’ll find a clue, but they don’t have time to wait for Batman’s detective skills to dig them up. They need help now.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice, Drake. Just give me the full schema—” The schematics came up on his lenses and he nodded. “Right. I will find them.”

“That might not be enough.” Tim stood up and put his own domino mask on, the lenses already showing the three separate video feeds and the schematics. “I can see where the Virus is being synthesized. I’ll get what I can and then head your way. They’re going to need it.”

Damian nodded. They both hopped onto their bikes and sped out like bats out of hell.

***

Damian took on a full-frontal assault on the building. Guards and employees who tried to slow him down were knocked out almost too efficiently.

Tim snatched a security card and went straight to the computer at the main desk. “The air vents are off. Get going.” The video feeds that they were seeing were quickly getting worse. Dick had been cruelly branded, Jason had lost a few fingers, and that was just the real-time feeds. In the delayed feed they began to see the horrors that had unfolded upon Jason and Dick reaching Black Mask’s office. Tim considered shutting that feed off, but it could still offer clues to their whereabouts and the degree of damage that their bodies had taken. Still, hearing Jason’s moans and grunts and seeing Dick’s dazed face…it was difficult.

But they weren’t there to mourn. They were there to save. Damian had made his way into the air vents and Tim couldn’t waste any time. He went to the stairwell and grappled up to the lab floor. He had to get the Virus.

SMACK!

Tim winced when Dick’s feet were broken in the feed and felt his responsibility deepen. They needed that Virus.

He reached the lab and was relieved to find it empty aside from some animal test subjects. The screaming of mice and chimpanzees rang in his ears as he searched for a fully synthesized dose.

While searching, he came across some notes that he found…worrisome.

As it turned out, there was yet to be any successful animal trials. Mice would recover only a little before bleeding faster than before. The Virus had been adjusted and re-tried over and over again until it had been worked to a point where it acted as a healing accelerant and minor anesthetic. It allowed some programing to command the body’s cells to do certain things, but the subjects had to be barely injured in order for it to work.

That had certainly not been the case with Jason.

The video of him being lobotomized had shown him looking particularly beat up. Tim shuddered to think that Black Mask had done all that with the success rate of his Techno-Organic Virus where it was. Jason was never supposed to survive. It was just a cruel means of performing another test, and it had worked.

It had worked because Jason wasn’t normal.

“Robin, you in?”

[There are more subfloors than I thought, Red. I’ve been scanning each one. Haven’t found them yet.]

“I can see that. Thanks for expanding my schematic map. Based on the feed, you’re looking for six men.” The crowbar swung into Jason’s chest with an awful thunk and Tim swallowed a shout. “Please hurry.”

[I’m going to make that bastard pay!]

Tim finally located a couple doses of the Virus and went to the door only to find himself face to face with Batman.

“I told you to wait.”

“I…we didn’t think that was a good move,” Tim said darkly. “Look, we don’t have time to waste. And Dick is in serious danger.”

“They both are.”

“No, Bruce, you don’t understand…”

***

Damian was disturbingly used to air vents, he thought to himself as he worked his way into the bowels of the Janus building. He kept the video feeds minimized except for the live one that showed the “better angle” of things. He kept that one large enough to keep track of in his vision, searching for anything that he could use.

What he was finding was simply more reasons to make Black Mask and his goons suffer. How dare they do such things to Grayson. How dare they torture the former Robins like they were nothing but common playthings.

Damian would make them pay. He’d make them regret breathing.

When Drake checked in with him, he put his emotions in check.

[Robin, you in?]

“There are more subfloors than I thought, Red,” he confessed. “I’ve been scanning each one. Haven’t found them yet,” much to his dismay. He had to find them soon. It had been made apparent in Black Mask’s torturous games that Grayson was in genuine danger. Jason would be revived if necessary, but Dick was expendable and barely holding on.

Damian kept searching until he heard an echo from the voice in the live feed and somewhere nearby. What had been said, though gave him pause.

“[…you fuckin’ freak…]”

X was harsh, but that sounded more like Todd. Damian felt a swell of hope at hearing Todd’s usual repartee.

THWACK!

Then the crowbar swung.

Damian only knew pieces of the story, but the Joker’s murder of the second Robin was something that had haunted his father to this day. It had been a warning to each Robin that followed. To every associate of the Batman. Caution was never to be ignored. Every step could bear consequences.

And it was happening again.

To the same Robin.

“Fuck it.”

Damian stopped scanning. He figured that Tim could fill in the remaining blanks himself.

Damian made it down another floor and the voices became just a bit clearer. He followed them, heard more whimpering. More suffering. Watched the feed as Todd was forced into auto-cannibalism in order to protect Grayson from any further suffering. It was noble, but if Damian didn’t get to them soon, it would be for naught. Could Todd really trust in his own ability to keep Grayson alive?

Then Todd began his assault. With his arms tied up and his airway still so restricted, there wasn’t much he could hope to accomplish. “Todd, you idiot, you’re going to get the both of you killed,” Damian growled, hurrying even more. He watched the feed as Todd yanked the metal anchor point out of the ceiling…

…and felt the movement underneath the ceiling panel he’d just stopped on.

“Lucky son of a bitch,” Damian whispered as he backed up and lifted the panel just enough to aim a birdarang at one of the large men who was encroaching upon Todd’s retreating form.

“Heads up!” Damian called out. Thankfully that was all Todd needed to catch on. The thugs could wait a moment. Things would be evened up if one more Robin could use his arms. One well aimed birdarang and a well-timed duck on Todd’s part and the ropes holding him were cut.

Of course, that only revealed the annoyingly useless arm dangling at his side.

“Wing’s in trouble!” Todd shouted.

Damian wasn’t one to accept demands from anyone unnecessarily, but there was no denying that Grayson looked bad.

“You’re fuckin’ screwed X!” The shout made Damian’s skin crawl. “I’ll break that other arm of yours and your legs as well! We’ll hang you up and use you like a fuckin’ swing! You hear me?”

“Just try and touch me, you piece of shit!”

Damian watched Todd take on the man, and the current feed dropped when the guy dropped the camera. That was the sick freak who had been filming it all.

The moment the guy got a hold of Todd, Damian unleashed three birdarangs at him, mercilessly nailing him in key points to take him out of the fight.

“I need a quick fix for my arm!” Todd noted.

Damian dropped from his hiding place and grabbed Todd’s limp arm firmly. “This is going to hurt, Todd,” he warned.

“I’d be disappointed if it didn’t.” The smug way of speaking was reassurance enough that Todd was himself again.

It would be a lie to say that Damian didn’t take some pleasure in popping his arm back into place. But Todd’s cry of shock was cut off by that too-tight collar around his neck. Damian quickly used another birdarang to slice it off of him and Jason sucked in a few gracious breaths.

“Thanks, twerp,” he managed to say.

“So, you’re back then.” Damian smiled. “About time.”

“Wish I hadn’t wasted so much time,” Todd said remorsefully, glancing down at Grayson’s shuddering form. “Help Dick. I’ll deal with the others.”

Damian looked at the large man whose head was twisted around and shook his head. “No. Father wouldn’t want you to—”

But Todd had already picked up the nearby crowbar and began ruthlessly hammering it into a goon’s head.

That’s when the door burst open with Batman and Red Robin on the other side.

Damian’s stomach churned at the way that his father looked over the massacre disdainfully. He felt the need to not only defend himself, but to justify Todd’s actions as well. After all, could he really be blamed for what he’d done?

“Agent X, kill code…”

Todd’s eyes grew wide and Damian thrust birdarangs at Black Mask with a vengeance. Batman’s code be damned, he couldn’t allow what was about to happen. Not when they’d come this far.

Todd seemed to recognize his situation, though, and pleaded. “Wait…”

“…arsenic.”

Damian’s birdarangs met their target a moment too late. Two in the neck and one in the chest. Batman shouted in protest, but Damian was more worried about the beaten man whose body seemed to crumple. Damian dropped in order to catch Todd as he fell and nearly felt his own shoulders ripped out of their sockets in the process.

He knew the steps.

Check for a pulse.

“Batman! No pulse!”

Damian proceeded with chest compressions, disgusted when he felt Todd’s already broken ribs shifting under his hands. Todd’s eyes, which had been a bright shade of green not a moment before, were now the same silvery hue as the Techno-Organic Virus. “Pupils non-responsive! Batman!”

“Red Robin!”

“Y-yeah!”

Batman lunged at Black Mask and did his best to beat answers out of him. Tim hurried over to Damian and took a vial of Techno-Virus from his belt, pouring it into Todd’s mouth and over his open wounds. His body began to heal before their eyes, but his pulse wasn’t returning.

“I have to check on Dick too,” Drake told Damian. “Don’t stop CPR.”

Drake moved over to Grayson and forced him to drink some of the virus, dripping the remaining contents of the vial over his wounds.

But it didn’t seem to help.

“Drake, what’s happening?” Damian demanded to know, worried out of his mind about his brother.

“Shit. It’s the Pit. The water from the Lazarus Pit is still in Jason’s veins. That mixed with the Virus is what was reviving him.”

“But Grayson—”

“Batman, we have to get them back to the cave!” Drake shouted. “They won’t last here much longer!”

Batman stopped beating Black Mask up and snarled. “You’re going to fix this,” he growled.

Roman Sionis just laughed, completely devoid of remorse.


	16. Window to a Broken Mind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Months have passed since the incident at Janus Cosmetics and things have settled down for the Bat Family, though the Cave feels like a mausoleum with Jason as a permanent resident of the med-bay.
> 
> Tim is given an opportunity to get a firsthand look into Jason's mind to see if there's even someone left in there to salvage. He quickly learns that the only thing more dangerous than Jason Todd is the nightmare that is his mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've made it this far, congrats! The worst is behind you!
> 
> If you're looking for a resolution? I make no promises.

“Cocoa?”

Tim stiffened and spun around, nearly throwing himself from his seat in front of the Bat Computer. Dick Grayson was about as light on his feet as anyone could be, but it was disturbing how quietly he managed to get around even in a wheelchair.

“Whoa. Did I wake you?”

“N-no! Geez, Dick. What, did you just materialize there?”

Dick smiled, but it wasn’t that same bright smile that he was known for. He hadn’t smiled in that way since the incident. “I thought you might want cocoa.”

Tim groaned and leaned back in his chair. “Cocoa? No. Triple espresso? Yes.”

Dick rolled his eyes and set the mug he’d brought next to the control panel. “I figured. I added some cream and sweetener so that you weren’t just drinking straight black coffee.”

Tim scoffed. Black coffee was exactly what he preferred, but Dick had never been able to understand that. “Thanks.”

Dick wheeled over so that he had a good look at the screen. “Any progress?”

Tim wanted more than anything to tell Dick that he’d had a breakthrough. That he’d found out how to reverse the kill-command. That Jason was finally awake, himself, and everything was going to be alright.

“I’m not a miracle worker, Dick,” he muttered sadly. “I can adjust the programming, but this is in his brain. Something could move wrong and I could gork him.”

“People have survived for years with a bullet lodged in their brain. I believe in you.”

Tim didn’t want to be believed in. He wanted the others to face the facts so that he wouldn’t have to spell them out. So that he could stop torturing himself day after day, desperately trying to accomplish what was proving to be as impossible as the man they were trying to save.

Batman emerged from the bowels of the cave where they continued to hold Black Mask captive. “Nothing,” he spat as he brushed past them. “Two months and the man’s given us nothing!”

He stormed over to the bubble where Jason was set up and checked on the life support machines. Everything was running fine and Jason looked perfectly preserved save for the three fingers; his pointer and middle on his right hand and his pinky on his left. It didn’t stop Bruce from holding his lifeless hand and taking deep breaths to calm himself down. “We’re still trying, Jason. Hang in there.”

Dick sighed and adjusted in his chair. “Thanks for everything you’re doing, Tim…I know it’s hard…”

“You have no idea,” Tim breathed. “But I’m still trying. I won’t give up.” He didn’t want to add that he couldn’t, but he felt it was implied.

That evening J’onn finally came by. They were going to have him check on Jason’s mind. See if perhaps he had answers for them hidden away in there. J’onn offered to take one person in with him with the understanding that they had to keep from falling into a depth that would be too difficult to reemerge from. This ruled Dick out quickly and, for safety sake, Bruce as well. Damian offered, figuring his distance from Jason would be helpful, but Tim stepped up.

“Maybe if I see what’s going on in his head, I’ll have a better idea of how to fix it,” he suggested. They all agreed, and Tim was chosen for the part.

“I must warn you, Jason Todd’s mind was dangerously fractured the last time I stepped into it and he fought me at every turn,” J’onn noted as they prepared for the session.

“Roy said Jason learned to block telepathic intrusions from the All-Caste. It might have been out of whack when he wasn’t in his right mind but now—”

“But now he’s in no mind at all,” J’onn said, cutting Dick off mid-sentence. “I cannot stress enough how important it is that you do not stray from me. Being lost in another’s mind is difficult to handle. It can consume you.”

Tim nodded. “I understand. I can do this.”

J’onn nodded and placed a hand on Tim’s head, then Jason’s head.

The next thing Tim knew, he was at the corner by Crime Alley, looking at the Monarch Theater. “Are you sure we’re in Jason’s head?”

“Most assuredly. Look.”

Tim looked down the alley as a young boy was pushed out from behind a dumpster. The boy rolled over his shoulder and scrambled to get his clothes straightened. “Shit…Asshole shorted me fifty bucks…”

Tim exhaled slowly. It had been hinted over the years that Jason had a history in child prostitution, but it wasn’t something Tim had ever sought to confirm.

Parked in the alley just across from the boy was the Batmobile. “Sweet.”

Tim moved to go interact with the young version of Jason, but J’onn held him back.

“Just wait. We have to see what he sees.”

What Jason saw was strange. The boy picked up a tire iron and made quick work of the tires, once they were all stacked Batman was thrown into the alley and landed on the hood of his car. The boy stumbled back from shock as Batman recovered and recognized his missing tires. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Hey, you’re the jerk who parked a car in Crime Alley,” the boy retorted, doing a good job of hiding his shaky knees.

The Joker came stomping over in a crude robot suit and proceeded to wallow on Batman. When things looked bad, the boy jumped onto the robot and wailed on it with the tire iron. He managed to mess up the mechanics, pop it open, and get in a few good hits on the Joker.

“Not bad, son. How’d you like to be a Robin?”

Now it felt a little like a parody. The boy reached into the robotic suit and pulled out a gun. “Ooh, is the baby-bird mad? I do love a good ol’ reunion. Let’s take a picture!”

“Jason, no!”

The boy shot the Joker before hopping off of the suit and landing on the hood of the car. “Why did you let him kill me?” The boy demanded. He aged a decade in the blink of an eye. “Why didn’t you kill him?” He trained the gun on Batman.

“I can never cross that line. Crossing that makes me evil.”

And the boy shot Batman as well. Right between the eyes, before laughing. “You just don’t get it. You never got it.”

Another Batman swooped in.

“Not bad, son. How’d you like to be a Robin?”

BANG!

Tim flinched. “Okay that was a little—”

Another Batman.

“Not bad, son.”

BANG!

Suddenly Batman’s face was different. Darker.

“Not bad, son.”

BANG!

“Do you understand, son?”

BANG!

Tim realized that Batman’s face and cowl had distorted until it was Black Mask taunting him. For everyone that he shot, another showed up and drew steadily closer and closer to the boy.

“When do we interfere?” Tim asked, feeling anxious.

“We do not interfere,” J’onn said. “We observe and understand. His mind is trapped in this rotation. It is convoluted. He seems to recognize his first meeting with Bruce, but it is still distorted.”

“Look out!” Tim shouted when one of the Black Mask’s got too close and slapped a collar onto Jason.

“No! We cannot interfere!” J’onn shouted.

But it was too late. Jason shot the Black Mask and turned on them, his eyes the same silvery color as the Techno-Virus. “My name…What’s my name?” he asked.

Tim swallowed a lump in his throat. “How do you want me to answer that?”

Jason scoffed and leveled his gun with Tim’s head. The scenery warped. Now they were inside the recreation room at Arkham Asylum. The inmates were shouting encouragement. Jason was dressed in the same drab clothes as the others.

“My name…say my name!” Jason demanded. Upon yelling, the world around them shattered like glass.

“This is bad, right?” Tim wondered.

“He’s recognized us as an intrusion! If he truly is trained against telepathic intrusions, we could be in danger!”

Jason fired two shots into J’onn and suddenly Tim was alone in a world of nothing.

“Shit! You don’t want to do this!”

“I asked you goddamned question.”

Tim tried to run, but there was no ground. There was nothing. “Your name is Jason!” he shouted. “You’re Jason Peter Todd!”

Gravity seemed to return. Atmosphere. The white was no longer without dimension. Now the white seemed to have walls. The outline of a door. A soft, paneled ceiling with an anchor point, and a leash threaded through it. Tim recognized the place.

“Why couldn’t I stop them?”

Tim shuddered as the scene from the live feed where they rescued Jason and Dick from was completely recreated but without Black Mask and his men around. Along with the stripped-down Jason who was barely standing on the stool, there was Jason dressed as the Red Hood, still with a gun trained on Tim.

“Jason?”

“Why did I just stand there?”

Tim watched the naked Jason shake and sputter as bloody cuts appeared on Dick’s kneeling form. The more the naked Jason whined the angrier Red Hood got. “Why? Why couldn’t I stop this?” Red Hood punched Jason in the stomach. “What is wrong with me?”

There was no point in trying not to interfere anymore. Tim kicked the gun out of Red Hood’s hand to at least make sure that he couldn’t shoot himself. That only annoyed Red Hood. As he snarled, another part of the room showed the scene from 2 hours prior to the live feed. Jason was bent over Dick, drooling and moaning as one of Black Mask’s men fucked into him.

“I should have stopped it. I should have helped him,” Red Hood said. His helmet’s voice modifier made it impossible to hear any emotion behind Jason’s voice, but it was easy to see him in distress. “I sold myself like that over one fucking leg shot? The hell was wrong with me? I’m a useless monster!”

“Look, this wasn’t you,” Tim tried to reassure him. “Black Mask just messed you up.”

The door in the room flew open to reveal the Wayne Mansion. There Tim caught glimpses of Jason over the last month. Arguing with Bruce, snapping at Dick, injuring Damian, and trying to steal Alfred.

“Why couldn’t I tell them what happened? Why did I stay there? I put them in danger. I hurt them. I did this…”

“It wasn’t you! It was X!”

Red Hood stared at Tim quietly as the world around them blacked out. One area lit up as if by a street lamp and Tim recognized a much younger Jason tied up and sitting painfully on a wooden rocking horse. “What’s happening?” Tim asked.

“Why didn’t he stop the man?” Red Hood shed his helmet and his clothes melted away to show the assassin’s uniform he was forced by Black Mask to wear. “He was hurt. He was humiliated. Why did he let it go on?”

Tim wanted to unbind the young Jason, but another street lamp turned on. This time a slightly more mature Jason snatched money from a guy behind a dumpster, wiping off his mouth with a feral look in his eyes. “See you again next week, sugar-lips?”

“Fuck on off to your wife, freak. You’re lucky I didn’t bite your junk off.”

As a reward for his mouth, the young Jason was pinned against the dumpster and fucked right there.

“Why did he let that happen?”

Tim was horrified. “No. That’s not…Oh god…This is in your head?”

Another light came on. This time Jason was dressed as Robin. He was in his later years with that moniker from the looks of things. He’d chased a pervert to a high apartment and backed him against the glass door blocking off the outer deck.

“So, you’re the Bat’s new piece of ass, huh?”

“Shut up!”

“You don’t have to be that freak’s little fetish. I’d cherish you as you are. Without the mask. Without the cape. Without the clothes.”

“You’re sick,” the young Jason snarled, poised for an attack. Tim tried to recall anything that he could about the previous Robin’s exploits. Only one situation came to mind.

“Jason, wait…”

“Nothing stops him,” the older Jason muttered. “Here, he acted out. Here, he messed everything up. Here, he lost Batman’s trust. Why would he let that happen?”

“I’ll bet you look good with a cock up your ass. Look like you’ve known a good fucking, too. I’d be just a little reminder then, huh?”

“Go to hell!” Young Jason tackled the man right through the glass door.

“No!” Tim managed to catch the man’s outstretched hand, keeping him from going over the railing to the abyss below. Assassin Jason stood next to young Jason looking disappointed. “You can’t help us.”

“You’ve been through hell! We know that! No one blames you for what you’ve been through!” Tim tried to explain. But the image of Batman looking up at the broken door where his own Robin looked down upon the man who had just “fallen” to his untimely death begged to differ. “Bruce just…he wants you to be better.”

One more street lamp came on, this time over Jason, still in his Robin suit, bound to a chair with razor wire as the shadow of a clown circled him, cackling in the darkness.

“All because he wanted a parent he never had,” assassin Jason muttered. “All because he wasn’t exactly what Bruce Wayne wanted.”

Tim continued to hold the man in place, though he felt unreasonably heavy. As long as he waited there, he couldn’t stop what was happening under the last street lamp. “Please, Jason, it’s not your fault.”

“I am X,” the assassin confirmed. He looked out at the bound Robin and added, “That is Jason.”

Tim shook his head, his grip failing him as the Joker began to lay into his captive Robin with the curved end of the crowbar. “No. You’re you. You’re Jason. You’re X. You’re both the same. You can’t be perfect. You can’t be what everyone wants you to be. You can’t be as good as the first Robin. You can’t be a good kid. You can’t be the perfect son. It’s not your fault. Life’s not fair. You’ve just been handed a pretty unfair piece of the puzzle. Everywhere you’ve been placed hasn’t fit right and it’s been awful. But was there ever a place you really felt like you fit?” Tim knew that his arm was going to give any moment and the man would drop into the abyss. “Wasn’t there a single moment in your life that wasn’t completely awful?”

Another lamp came on, this time showing a place all too familiar to Tim: the gym at the Wayne Mansion. There Jason was hanging onto a suspended ring like it was a monkey bar at a playground, desperately trying to kick his legs back and forth to make it swing.

“Hey there, Little Wing.”

“Piss off, Grayson. Alfred moved me to a different room. You can sleep in your own goddamned bed. I’m not looking to be any fairy’s replacement,” the young Jason said as he hooked one leg onto the ring and pulled himself up so that he was sitting in it and was able to use just his legs to get it swinging again with more momentum.

“Look, I came to apologize for…jumping on you in bed.”

Tim grimaced.

“It’s been just over a month. I…yeah, I still didn’t think they’d put some new kid in my old room, but Bruce has a soft spot for—”

“What, hopeless cases? I don’t need Bruce. I don’t need Batman either. Ma Gunn taught me…I mean, I can take care of myself.” When he had enough momentum, Jason leapt out of the ring and just barely missed the next one, falling a good ten feet towards the ground. Dick slid underneath, catching Jason while knocking the wind out of himself in the process.

“Wh-what’s the big idea!?” Young Jason scrambled off of Dick and backed away.

“You…you were falling,” was all that Dick had to say. “As long as I’m nearby, I’ll always catch you. It’s as simple as that.”

Young Jason blushed hotly and turned away. “Piss off, old-news! I don’t need your pity!”

“You don’t have it. But you do have my promise.”

“Why couldn’t he look away?” X asked sadly, standing at Tim’s side.

Suddenly the weight of the man Tim was holding onto was non-existent. One hard tug and the man flew over the railing and landed right in front of X. It was no longer the man who had harassed Robin before. Now, once again, it was Red Hood.

“Dick Grayson…The OG. His legacy was a lot to live up to. But until the night when he jumped me in bed, I’d only heard about him from Bruce and Alfred,” Red Hood explained. “And that night, I was so afraid. I’d finally found a home. I didn’t have to sleep with one eye open like at Ma Gunn’s. Then once again, some strange man was on top of me and my world blew up.”

“Alfred didn’t open up another room,” X muttered. “It would have meant more work for him and they weren’t expecting him to be home so soon after leaving.”

Tim looked between each version of Jason sadly. “You…you were happy about this?”

“It was a genuine accident,” Red Hood said. “Dick didn’t try to take something from me, he just tried to keep me from strangling him. And then, after seeing him on patrol up close for the first time, I tried to move like him and…and he caught me like that…No one had ever been that kind to me.”

“What about Bruce?” Tim brought up.

“There was still a price to living with Bruce. And while I can look back at Ma Gunn’s fondly now, I had to risk my life to help him out. I proved my worth to him. I proved to be nothing but clumsy when trying to be like Grayson, though, and rather than seem disappointed, Dick just seemed…happy. I’d never really gotten unconditional approval before. It was…nice…”

“Unconditional?” X seemed dubious about it. “Nothing is without a cost.”

Tim stood between X and Red Hood and held both of their hands. “You’d paid more than your fair share. And even when you couldn’t remember this, you couldn’t kill Dick. That meant something. So, the boy from Crime Alley, Ma Gunn’s star student, Bruce’s second ward, the second Robin, Dick’s younger brother, my predecessor, Bruce’s hardest loss, the resurrected warrior, the All-Caste Chosen, the prodigal son, the Red Hood, Wing Man, the Outlaw, the assassin, the bookworm, and the older brother to me and Damian. You’re all of those people. You’re not different entities. You are you, Jason.”

One bright flash of light and suddenly Tim was on some rooftop over Gotham. Jason, dressed in casual clothes, was sitting with his feet dangling off the edge. He held a cigarette between his lips and looked out over the busy city.

“I put you guys through a lot, huh?” Jason muttered, never taking the cigarette from his mouth.

“Understatement of the year.” Tim settled down next to him and leaned back to look at the sky. “I’ve never seen stars in Gotham.”

Jason scoffed. “You must not have been out much in the Zero Year. City went dark. It was the first and only time I’ve seen the stars in Gotham, but I’ve never forgotten. Guess in my head, that’s how I see the place.” Jason took the cigarette out of his mouth and blew out a long drag of smoke. “Look, I can’t do anything cooped up in here. I’d…I’d like to make up for the mess I made.”

“I’m trying to fix you,” Tim assured him. “It’s not easy. If I mess up the tiniest thing, I could screw up your head and leave you brain dead!”

“So?”

Tim choked on nothing. “What do you mean, ‘so’? I’d be killing you!”

Jason took another long drag. “Timbers, you saw the videos, right?” Tim’s silence was confirmation enough. “It’s all still in here, right along with the feeling of that old crowbar and the immediacy of the dynamite that killed me, obviously. If you gork me, well, it’s certainly not the worst thing that’s happened to me.”

“But…I just…”

“I’d offer you a drag to mellow you out a little, but you don’t smoke, and this is all in my head anyways,” Jason joked.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“I won’t stop you.”

“Why were you trying to kick us out of your head?”

“Manhunter went pretty deep when I was just X. He was…well I get that he didn’t mean any harm now, but the memories just at the surface were all pretty bad times in my life. It was a lot to throw at me. Seeing him in here again…Guess it brought out the worst in me. And seeing you with him? Can you blame me for being weary?”

Tim nodded. “Fair enough. One more question then.”

“Fire away.”

“Do you like Dick?”

Jason smirked. “Whoa. Forward of you. I’m not exactly the straightest arrow, but I wouldn’t say I’m a big fan of—”

“I mean Grayson.”

Jason punched Tim’s shoulder softly. “I know what you meant. I…yeah. I like Dickwad. He’s different from anyone I’ve ever known. He’s really just a ray of sunshine, even when he doesn’t know it. And for a guy who’s so used the nights on the streets, that’s really attractive.

Tim grimaced. “You’d have killed me…Damian…hell you even tried to kill Bruce, but because he’s your ray of sunshine, you just couldn’t kill Dick?”

“Would it help if I said I’m sorry?”

“Not really. But we’re used to you being an ass.” The two of them laughed together for what felt like the first time.

Tim stood up and offered a hand. “You once said you wished you had a brother like me. That maybe then you might have turned out okay. Well, you do have me for a brother. I can accept that you’re an ass. That’s just how brothers are. And whatever you do, I’ll be there to back you up, okay?”

Jason took Tim’s hand. “Just give it your all, Timbers. I’m not afraid of death, so there’s no reason to hesitate.”


	17. Stolen Goodbyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having spoken with the man himself, Tim decides to take the leap and revive Jason.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tadaaaah! Final chapter time!

“Tim!”

Tim woke up gasping for air and face to face with Dick. “Uwaaah!” He tried to retreat only to fall backwards over the chair he’d been sitting on. “Owwwww.”

Dick wheeled around him. “Sorry! I was trying to wake you up. J’onn had already come back and you were still out cold.”

Tim scrambled to his feet and over to the Bat Computer. He pulled up the program he’d been working on and linked it to the dormant Techno-Organic Virus in Jason’s brain.

“Wait! Tim!”

“I have to do this!” Tim told everyone. “He wanted me to do this.”

“You said it could kill him,” Damian reminded him.

“We should test it before you—”

“He’d rather be dead,” Tim tried to explain. “He’s been waiting long enough.” He slammed on the enter key and then scrambled back over to Jason. “It shouldn’t take long for it to upload to the Virus…Come on…Come onnnnn…”

But there was no movement. No change. Nothing happened. “No…Nononono…” Tim stumbled away and bolted for the Manor to mourn his failure.

Bruce looked sadly at Jason. “Leave the machines on. At least for a few more nights…”

Alfred sniffled and fixed Jason’s blanket. “Very well, sir.”

“Dick, Damian…you should get some rest.”

“No, Father. You rest. I can handle patrol for the night,” Damian declared. “I…I know you haven’t been watching your health. Please. I will keep in touch. Stick to the shadows. Just rest for tonight.”

Bruce nodded solemnly. “Thank you, Damian…I…I have been neglecting myself…”

Alfred sniffled again. “Only a little more than usual, sir. Come now, boys. I have dinner waiting. And Master Damian, there will be a fresh batch of gingersnap cookies waiting for you. I daresay I have perfected Miss Lane’s recipe and improved upon it.”

Damian nodded. “Excellent, Pennyworth. See to it that Titus and Alfred are also fed in my absence.” He hopped on his bike and took to the streets. Alfred managed to usher the others back into the mansion for a glum dinner before they each went to their rooms to at least try to get some sleep.

***

Dick awoke from his usual nightmare, sobbing into his pillow. His body still ached. In his nightmare he still wore a collar. His arms were still bound. Jason was still alive.

Sometimes they raped Jason while the two of them were still connected by the leash. Dick could feel every awful tug at his neck as the too-large men thrust into Jason again and again until Dick couldn’t breathe and he’d wake up.

Sometimes they burned Dick, sliced him up, broke his bones, gouged his eyes, and continued to tear him apart until he was so focused on the pain that he forgot about Jason, and upon finally looking up, Jason would be nothing more than a lifeless corpse, hanging from the collar on his neck.

It always took longer to wake from those nightmares. Now, after what Tim had finally done, it was over. This new nightmare had felt different. He wasn’t torn apart. Jason wasn’t raped. He was on a rooftop as Nightwing, looking out at the star-less sky over Gotham. Sitting nearby, kicking his feet off the ledge of the roof, was the Red Hood. Jason had taken off his helmet, but his domino mask was still affixed, hiding his blue-green eyes. He was smoking his favorite brand of cigarettes and looking out at the horizon with a calmness that Dick wished he could experience as well.

Jason’s mouth moved, but Dick couldn’t hear anything. He asked Jason to repeat, but nothing but silence greeted him. He begged Jason to try again. To say something, anything, but no words reached him before Jason put on his helmet and leapt.

Dick hugged his pillow and tried hard to stifle his crying. He couldn’t accept it. Couldn’t believe it. After everything, once again, Jason Todd was—

“Hey there, Dickwad.”

—sitting on Dick’s bed.

“I…I can hear you…”

“Yeah. I’m right here. And…I’m so sorry. You should have never been involved. I messed up and you paid for it.”

Dick reached out to Jason, longing to feel his warmth. Still convinced that he was dreaming, Dick was just happy to finally see Jason without that collar. To hear him speak rather than scream or cry. “I miss you…”

“I’m sorry. But I can’t stay. I can’t face the others. I just came to say goodbye.”

“Don’t…don’t leave me…please…”

“Dick, I don’t want to but—”

“I love you, Jay. I love you…don’t go…”

Jason slipped into the bed with Dick and pulled him into his arms. “I’m right here. Just for now, I’m right here.”

This nightmare had changed to an almost pleasant dream. Dick could feel Jason’s warmth. The faint smell of antiseptic and blood. The way that his hair tickled Dick’s forehead as he drew his face close. It all felt so real. So peaceful.

“I’m sorry…” Dick sobbed. “I’m so—”

Jason silenced Dick by stealing a kiss. The action was so intimate. Dick felt himself breaking down more, tormented by his own desires.

“Jay…” Dick reached up, gently tousling the streak of white hair that had been left to grow out while Jason was comatose. “There’s so much I wish I could have said.”

Jason smiled and pressed his thumb over Dick’s lips, admiring the scars that remained. “I should have never let him hurt you.”

“I wish…I wish I could have done more to help you,” Dick whispered.

Jason stole another kiss before tucking Dick’s head under his chin. “You’ve always been enough. Thank you.”

Dick inhaled deeply, basking in Jason’s warmth. This was a dream he never wanted to wake from.

***

Dick wheeled down to the dining room to find his family circled around the table looking…frustrated? That wasn’t the sort of feeling he expected the day after they failed to wake Jason. “What happened? Is everyone okay?”

“When I came back from patrol, the cave seemed…different,” Damian began. “It was quiet.”

“Yeah, well, we were all upstairs sleeping, which really isn’t normal for a bunch of bats in the night but—”

“He’s gone, Dick,” Bruce said flatly.

Dick’s stomach twisted. “Roman? He escaped? H-how? How could we just sleep through him getting out of there! How could we—”

“Roman Sionis is dead,” Tim confirmed. “Bound to the wall, a batarang in his chest, an IV attached to a bottle of hydrofluoric acid flowing down his throat. Written in blood on the wall behind him was one word. ‘Sorry.’”

Dick closed his eyes. “Jay…Jay’s gone?”

“Master Jason is alive. That is a comfort…I only wish he had…had chosen to stay with us.”

“He’s still a cold-blooded killer. He proved that. Jason Todd or X, he’s still a killer.”

“And gods forbid a killer should live under your roof,” Damian growled. “I’ll finish breakfast in my room, Pennyworth.” Damian picked up his plate and Titus followed him out of the dining room.

Dick thought back to his room. To his dream. To the draft he’d noticed in the morning when his window was open.

“He’s alive.” Dick scoffed. “And like always, he ran…”

Tim sighed. “Jerk had me. He tricked me into saving him, made me believe I’d killed him, and then did whatever the hell he wanted. A real piece of work.”

Dick could still feel the warmth of Jason’s arms around him. “Yeah…Total bastard.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> If anyone feels unsatisfied by the ending, well, I understand. I've been toying with some follow-up stories. Most of which are just as grim as this has been, so maybe I'll just make a series of alternate options. Give some people a happy end. Give some a horrible end. See where my twisted head wanders too.
> 
> If anyone has any requests regarding this story, I'm all ears as well. 
> 
> Thanks again! One last shout out to QueenOfThePirates for helping me keep my head on straight during the stressful week that resulted in this story!


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